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^::i address* 




TO THE 



NON.SLAVEHOLDERS OF THE SOUTH, 



ON THE 



SOCIAL AND POLITICAL EVILS 



SLAVERY. 



^ew) Hork: 

PUBLISHED BY THE AM. & FOR. ANTI-SLAVERY SOCIETY, 

WILLIAM HARNED, AGENT, 61 JOHN STREET. 









A\^')J 



{tCf- For Sale at the Depository of the Amer. and For. A. S. Society, 
No. 61 John Street, New York, at $35 per thou.sand, .^4 per hun- 
dred, 50 cents per dozen, and 5 cents for a single copy. 

WILLIAM HARNED, Publishing Agent. 



7 ' 

4-4 



ADDRESS 



THE NON-SLAVEHOLDERS OF THE SLAVE STATES. 

Fellow-Citizens : 

We ask your attention to the injuries inflicted upon you and your 
children, by an institution which hves by your sufferance, and will 
die at your mandate. Slavery is maintained by you whom it im- 
poverishes and degrades, not by those upon Avhom it confei-s 
wealth and influence. These assertions Avill be received by you 
and others with surprise and increduhty. Before you condemn 
them, ponder the following considerations and statistics. 

We all know that the sugar and cotton cultivation of the South 
is conducted, not like the agriculture of the North, on small 
farms and with few hands, but on vast plantations and with large 
gangs of negroes, technically called " the force." In the breed- 
ing States, men, women and children form the great staple for 
exportation ; and like other stock, require capital on the part of 
those who follow the business of rearing them. It is also a 
matter of notoriety, that the price of slaves has been and still is 
such as to confine their possession almost exclusively to the rich. 
We might as well talk of poor men owning herds of cattle and 
studs of horses, as gangs of negroes. When an infant will bring 
one hundred, and a man from four hundred to a thousand dollars 
in the market, slaves are not commodities to be foimd in the 
cabins of the poor. You are moreover aware that the great 
capitalists of the South have their wealth chiefly invested in 
plantations and slaves, and not as with us in commerce and 
manufactures. 

It has been repeatedly stated that Mr. Carroll, of Baltimore, 
the former president of the Colonization Society, was the owner 
of 1,000 slaves. The newspapers, in annoimcing the death of 
Mr. Pollock, of North Carolina, remarked that he had left 1,500 
slaves. In the account of Mr. Madison's funeral, it was men- 
tioned that he was followed to the grave by 100 of his slaves, 
and it is probable that the women and children were not included. 
The following article, from the Gospel Messenger for August, 
1842, gives us some idea of the feudal vassalage prevaihng on 
the estates of some of j-our lordly planters. " A xoble deed. — 
Dr. Mercer, of Adams conntv. Mississippi, has lately erected, at 
1 



his own expense, and for the advantage of his vast plantation, and 
the people on his lands, a neat church and parsonage house, at 
the cost of OA'er -^-30,000. He pays the salary of the minister, 
$1,200 a year, besides his meat and bread. On Bishop Otey's 
late visit to that congregation, he and Mr. Deacon, the incumbent, 
baptized in one day one hundred and eight children and ten 
adults, all belonging to the plantation." 

At the North a farmer hires as many men as his work requires ; 
at the South the laborers cannot be separated from the women 
and children. These are livopcrty, and must be owned by some- 
body. Now when we take this last circumstance into considera- 
tion, and at the same time recollect that the very value of the 
slaves debars the poor from owning them — and connect these 
two facts with the character of the cultivation in which slave 
labor is employed ; we must be ready to admit thot those who do 
employ this species of labor, cannot on an average hold less than 
ten slaves, including able-bodied men, their wives and children. It 
appears by the census, that of the slave population, the two 
sexes are almost exactly equal in number ; and that there are 
two children under ten years of age, for every male slave over 
that age. Hence, if a planter employs only three men, we may 
take it for granted that his slave family consists of at least 12 
souls, viz. : 3 men, 3 women, and G children. We of course 
estimate the number of children too low, since there will be 
some over ten years of age. It thus appears that the average 
number of slaves we assign to each slaveholder is probably far 
below the truth ; but we purposely avoid even the approach to 
exaggeration. Now the number of slaves in the United States 
by "the last census, was 2,48*7,113; of course according to 
our estimate of ten slaves to one master, there can be only 
248,711 slaveholders. 

The number of tchife males over 2jQ years of aye in the 

slave states and territories was .... ], 010,307 
Deduct Slaveholders, viz 248,711 



And we have the number we arc now addressing . 767,596 

We are not forgetful that our enumeration must embrace some 
who arc the sons of slaveholders, and who are therefore interested 
in ujiholding the system, — but we are fully convinced that our 
estimate of the number of slaveholders is far beyond the truth, 
and that we may thei-eforo safely throw out of account the very 
moderate numbei- of slaveholders' sons above 20 years of age, 
and not themselves possessing slaves. 

Here thpn. ffljou-fitizens. vf>u sec vour strength. You have 



a majoriiy of u 18,885 over the slaveholders ; and now we re- 
peat, that with a numerical majority of more than half a million, 
slavery lives or dies at your behest. 

We know that this result is so startling ana iniexpected, that 
you will scared}" credit the testimony ot figures tliemselves. It 
is so commonly taken for granteJ, tliat every white man at the 
South is a slaveholder, that many will doubtiugly inquire, where 
are these non-slaveholding citizens to be foimd ? \Ve answer, 
ever3'where. Is poverty of rare occurrence in any country ? Has 
it ever happened that the mass of any people were rich' enough 
to keep, for their own convenience, such expensive laborers — as 
southern slaves ? Slavery moreover is monopolizing in its ten- 
dency, and leads to the accumulation of property in few hands. 
It is also to be observed, that the high price of slaves, and the 
character of the cultivation in which they are employed, both 
conspire to concentrate this class of laborers on particular spots, 
and in the hands of large ]n-oprietors. Now the census shows 
that in some districts the slaves are collected in vast numbers, 
while in others they are necessarily few. Thus, for instance, in 
Georgetown district, S. Carolina, there are about 7.5 slaves to 
every wdiite man, woman and child, in the district. Now if 
from the Avhite population in this district we exclude all but the 
slaveholders themselves, the average number of slaves held by 
them would probably exceed one hundi'ed. On the other hand, 
"we find all through the slave States, many districts where the 
slaves bear a very small proportion to the whites, and where, of 
course, the non-slaveholders must form a vast and overwhelming 
majority. A fcAV instances must suffice. 

The whites are to the slaves in Brook Co., Va., as 

Yancy Co., N. Car., 22 

" " " Union Co., Ga., 

De Kalb Co., Ala., 

« " « Fentress Co., Tenn. 

" " " Morgan Co., Ky.,* 

Taney Co., Mo., 
Searcy Co., Ark., 

There is not a State or Territory in the Union in which you, 
fellow-citizens, have not an overwhelming majority over the slave- 

* Mr. Nichola,«, in a speech in the Kentucky Legishiture in 1837, ob- 
jected to calling a convention to alter the Constitution, because in such 
a convention he believed the abolition of slavery would be agitated ; and 
lie reminded the house, that in the State " the shiveholders do not stand 
in the ratio of move than one to six or seven." Of course slavery is 
maintained in Kentucky, through the consent of the aou-tjlavcholders. 



85 


to 




, 22 


to 




35 


to 




16 


to 




43 


to 




74 


to 




80 


to 




311 


to 





holders ; and the majority is probably the greatest in those in 
Avhich the slaves are the most numerous, because in such they 
are chiefly concentrated on large plantations. 

It has been the policy of the slaveholders to keep entirely out 
of sight their own numerical inferiority, and to speak and act as 
if their interests were those of the whole community. They are 
the nobility of the south, and they find it expedient to forget that 
there are any commoners. Hence with them slavery is the in- 
stitution of the SOUTH, while it is in fact the institution of only a 
portion of the people of the south. It is their craft to magnify 
and extol the importance and advantages of their institution ; and 
hence we are told by Gov. McDuffie, that slavery *' is the COR- 
NER STONE of our republican institutions." To defend this 
corner stone from the assaults of truth and reason, he audacious- 
ly proposed to the legislature, that abolitionists should be punish- 
ed '•■ with death without benefit of clergy." This gentleman, like 
most demagogues, while professing great zeal for the Peoplk, 
whose interests were for the most part adverse to slavery, was in 
fact looking to his own aggrandizement. He was, at the very 
time he uttered these absurd and murderous sentiments, a great 
planter, and his large "force " was said to have raised in 1836, 
no less than 122,500 lbs. of cotton.* In the same spirit, and 
with the same design, the Report of a Committee of the South 
Carolina Legislature, made in 1842, speaks of slavery " as an an- 
cient domestic institution, cherished in the hearts of the people at 
the south, the eradication of which would demohsh our whole sys- 
tem of policy, domestic, social, and political." 

The skiveholders form a powerful landed aristocracy, banded 
together for the preservation of their own privileges, and ever 
endeavoring, for obvious reasons, to identify their private interests 
with the public welfare. Thus have the landed proprietors of 
England declaimed loudly on the blessings of dear bread, because 
the corn laws keep up rents and the price of land. The wealth 
and influence of your aristocracy, together with your own pover- 
ty, have led you to look up to them with a reverence bordering 
on that which is paid to a feudal nobility by their hereditary de- 
pendents. Hence it is, that, unconscious of your own power, you 
liave permitted them to assume, as of right, the whole legislation 
and government of your respective States. We now propose to 
call your attention to the practical results of that control over 
your interests, which, by your sufferance, they have so long exer- 
cised. We ask you to join us in the inquiry how far you have 
been benefitted by the care of your guardians, when compared 



* See tlie aewspapere of the day. 



with the peopk of the North, who have been left to govern them* 
selves. We will pursue this inquiry iq the following order : 

1. Increase of Population. 

2. State of Education. 

3. State of Industry and Enterprise. 

4. Feeling towards the Laboring Classes. 
6. State of Rehgion. 

6. State of Morals. 

7. Disregard for Human Life. 

8. Disregard for Constitutional Obligations. 

9. Liberty of Speech. 

10. Liberty of the Press. 

11. MiUtary Weakness. 

I. INCREASE OF POPULATION. 

The ratio of increase of population, especially in this country, 
is one of the surest tests of public prosperity. Let us then 
again listen to the impartial testimony of the late census. From 
this we learn that the increase of population in the free States 
from 1830 to 1840, was at the rate of .38 per cent., while the 
increase of the free population in the slave States was only 23 per 
cent. Why this difference of 15 in the two ratios ? No other 
cause can be assigned than slavery, which drives from your bor- 
ders many of the virtuous and enterprising, and at the same time 
deters emigrants from other States and from foreign countries 
from settling among you. 

The influence of slavery on population is strikingly illustrated 
by a comparison between Kentucky and Ohio. These two States 
are of nearly equal areas, Kentucky however having about 3000 
square miles more than the other.'* They are separated only by 
a river, and are both remarkable for the fertility of their soil ; but 
one has, from the beginning, been cursed with slavery, and the 
other blessed with freedom. Now mark their respective careers. 

In 1792, Kentucky was erected into a State, and Ohio in 1802. 

Free population of Kentucky. Free population of Ohio. 

1790 61,227; a wilderness. 

1800 180,612, 45,365 

1810 325,950, 230,760 

1820 437,585, 581,434 

1830 522,704, 937,903 

1840 597,570, 1,519,467 

* American Almanac for 1843, p. 206 



6 

The representation of the two States in Congress, has been as 
follows : 

1802, Kentucky 6, Ohio 1, 

1812, " 9, " 6, 

1822, " 12, " 14, 

1832, " 13, " 19, 

1842, " 10, " 21, 

The value of laud, other things being equal, is in proportion to 
the density of the population. Now the population of Ohio is 
38.8 to a square mile, while the free population of Kentucky is 
but 14.2 to a square mile — and probably the price of land in the 
two States is much in the same proportion. You are told, much 
of the wealth is invested in negroes — yet it obviously is a wealth 
that impoverishes ; and no stronger evidence of the truth of this 
assertion is needed, than the comparative price of land in the free 
and slave States. The two principal cities of Kentucky and Ohio 
are Louisville and Cincinnati ; tlie former with a population of 
21,210, the latter with a population of 40,338. Why this differ- 
ence ? The question is answered by the Louisville Journal. The 
editor, speaking of the two rival cities, remarks, "The most po- 
tent cause of the more rapid advancement of Cincinnati than 
Louisville is the absence of slavery. The same influences 
which made Ohio the young giant of the West, and is advancing 
Indiana to a grade higher than Kentucky, have operated in the 
Queen City. They have no dead weight to carry, and conse- 
quently have the advantage in the race." 

In 1840, Mr. C. M. Clay, a member of the Kentucky Legisla- 
ture, published a pamphlet against the repeal of the law prohibit- 
ing the importation of slaves from the other States. We extract 
the following : 

" The world is teeming with improved machinery, the combined 
development of science and art. To us it is all lost ; ive are com- 
paratively living in centuries that are gone ; we cannot make it, we 
cannot use it whe^i made. Ohio is many years younger, and pos- 
sessed of fewer advantages than our State. Cincinnati has manu- 
factories to sustain lier ; last year she put up one thousand 
houses. Louisville, with su]iciior natural advantages, as all the 
world knows, wrote ' to rent,' upon many of her houses. Onio 
IS A FREE State, Kentlx'kv a slave State." 

Mr. Thomas F. Marshall, of Kentucky, in a pamphlet published 
the same year, and on the same subject, draws the following 
comparison between Virginia and New York : 

" In 1790, Virginia, with "70,000 square miles of territory, 



contained a population of 749,308. New York, upon a surface 
of 45, 60S square miles, contained a population of 344,120. 
This statement exhibits in favor of Virginia a difference of 24,242 
square miles of territory, and 408,188 in population, which is the 
double of New York, and 68,600 more. In 1830, after a race of 
forty years, Virginia is found to contain 1,211,405 souls, and New 
York 1,918,608, which exhibits a difference in favor of New 
York of 607,203. The increase on the part of Virginia will be 
perceived to be 463,187, starting from a basis more than double 
as large as that of New York. The increase of New York, upon 
a basis of 340,120, has been 1,578,391 human beings. Virginia 
has increased in a ratio of 61 per cent., and New York in that of 
566 per cent. 

" The total amount of property in Virginia under the assess- 
ment of 1838, was $211,930,508. The aggregate value of real and 
personal property in New York, in 1839, was $654,000,000, ex- 
hibiting an excess in New York over Virginia of capital of $442,- 
069,492. 

" Statesmen may differ about policy, or the means to be em- 
ployed in the promotion of the public good, but surely they 
ought to be agreed as to what prosperity means. I think there 
can be no dispute that New York is a greater, richer, a more 
prosperous and powerful State than Virginia. What has occa- 
sioned the difference ? There is but one explana- 
tion of the facts I have shown. The clog that has stayed the 
march of her people, the incubus that has weighed down her 
enterprise, strangled her commerce, kept sealed her exhaustless 
fountains of mineral wealth, and paralyzed her arts, manufactures 
and improvement, is NEGRO SLAVERY." 

These statements were made before the results of the last 
census were known. By the census of 1840, it appears that in 
the ten preceding years, 

The population of Virginia has increased 28,392 

In the same time the population of N. Y. increased 710,413 
The rate of increase in Virginia was 2.3 per cent. 

New York, 33.7 

Virginia has 12.5 free inhabitants to a square mile. 
New York 52.7 
In 1790, Massachusetts, with Maine, had but 378,717 inhabitants, 

Maryland, 319,728 

In 1840, Massachusetts alone, 737,699 «' 

Maryland, 469,232 " 

Now let it be recollected that Marvland is nearly double the 



8 

size of Massachusetts. In the last there are 98.8 free inhabitants 
to the square mile ; in the former only 27.2. 

If we turn to the new States, we find that slavery and freedom 
have the same influence on population as in the old. Take, for 
instance, Michigan and Arkansas. They came into the Union 
about the same time — 

In 1830, the population of Arkansas was 30,388 

In 1840, " " 9'7,5'74 

In 1830, " Michigan, 31,639 

In 1840, " " 212,267 

The ratio of increase of Avhite inhabitants, for the last ten 

years, has been in Arkansas as 200 per cent ; in Michigan, 574 

per cent. In both instances the increase has been chiefly owing 

to immigration ; but the ratio shows the influence of slavery in 

retarding immigration. Compare also Alabama and Illinois — 

In 1830, the free population of Alabama, was 191,975 

Illinois, 157,455 



Excess in favor of Alabama 34,520 



In 1840, free population of Illinois, 476,183 

Alabama, 337,224 



Excess in favor of Illinois, 138,959 

We surely need not detain you with farther details on this head, 
to convince you what an enormous sacrifice of happiness and 
prosperity you are offering on the altar of slavery. But of the 
character and extent of this sacrifice you have as yet had only 
a partial glimpse. Let us proceed to examine 

II. THE STATE OF EDUCATION IN THE SLAVE 
STATES. 

The maxim that " Knowledge is power," has ever more or less 
influenced the conduct of aiistocracies. Education elevates the 
inferior classes of society, teaclies them their rights, and points 
out the means of enforcing them. Of course, it tends to diminish 
the influence of wealth, birth, and rank. In 1671, Sir William 
Berkley, then Governor of Virginia, in his answer to the inquiries 
of the Committee of the Colonies, remarked, " I thank God that 
there are no free schools nor printing presses, and I hope we 
shall not have them these hundred years." The spirit of Sir 
William seems still to preside in the councils of his own Virginia, 
and to actuate those of the other slave States. 

The power of the slaveholders, as we have alreadv showed 



9 

you, depends on the acquiescence of tlie major part of the white 
inhabitants in their domination. It cannot be, therefore, the in- 
terest or the inchnation of tlie sagacious and reflecting among 
them, to promote the intellectual improvement of the inferior 
class. 

In the free States, on the contrary, where there is no caste an- 
swering to your slaveholders — where the Feoj^le hterally partake 
in the government, mighty efforts are made for general education ; 
and in most instances, elementary instruction is, through the public 
liberality, brought within the reach of the children of the poor. 
You have lamentable experience, that such is not the case where 
slaveholders bear rule. 

But you will receive with distrust whatever we may say as to 
the comparative ignorance of the free and slave States. Examine 
then for yourselves the returns of the last census on this point. 
This document gives us the number of white persons over twenty 
years of age in each State, who cannot read and write. It appears 
that these persons are to the ivhole white population in the several 
States as folloAvs, viz. : 



Connecticut, 


1 to 


every 568 


Louisiana, 


1 to 


every 


38i 


Vermont, 




" 473 


Maryland, 




" 


27 


N. Hamp., 




" 310 


Mississippi, 




« 


20 


Mass., 




166 


Delaware, 




(< 


18 


Maine, 




108 


S. Carolina, 




(( 


17 


Michigan, 




97 


Missouri, 




" 


16 


R. Island, 




67 


Alabama, 




(( 


15 


New Jersey, 




58 


Kentucky, 




" 


13i 


New York, 




56 


Georgia, 




" 


13 


Penn., 




50 


Virginia, 




" 


12* 


Ohio, 




43 


Arkansas, 




<( 


Hi 


Indiana, 




18 


Tennessee, 




<( 


11 


Illinois, 




17 


N. Carolina, 




" 


7* 



It will be observed by looking at this table, that Indiana and 
Illinois are the only free States, which in point of education are 
surpassed by any of the slave States : for this disgraceful cir- 
cumstance three causes may be assigned, viz., their recent settle- 
ment, the influx of foreigners, and emigration from the slave 
States. The returns from New York, Rhode Island, New Jersey 
and Pennsylvania, are greatly affected by the vast number of 
foreigners congregated in their cities, and employed in their 
manufactories and on their public works. In Ohio, also, there la. 

* This summary from the return of the census, is copied from the 
Richmond (Va.) Compiler, 
1* 



10 

a large foreign fiopulation ; and it is well known that comparatively 
few emigrants from Europe seek a residence in the slave States, 
where there is little or no employment to invite them. But what 
a commentary on slavery and slaveholders is afforded by the gross 
ignorance prevailing in the old States of South Carolina, Virginia, 
and North Carolina! But let us proceed. The census gives a 
retm-n of '' scholars at public charge." 

Of these, there are in the free States, 432,173 

" " slave States, 35,580 

Ohio alone has 51,812 such scholars, — more than are lo be 
found in the 13 slave States! Her neighbor Kentucky has 
429 ! ! Let us compare in this particular the largest and the 
smallest State in the Union. 

Virginia has scholars at public charge 9,791 

Rhode Island 10,912* 

But we have some official confessions, which give a still more 
deploT-able account of Southern ignorance. In 1837, Governor 
Clarke, in his message to the Kentucky Legislature, remarked, 
" By the computation of those most familiar with the subject, onk 

THIRD of the adult rOPULATION OF TPIE STATE ARE UNABLE 
TO WRITE THEIR NAMES." 

Governor Campbell reported to the Virginia Legislature, that 
from the returns of 98 clerks, it appeared that of 4614 applica- 
tions for marriage licenses in 1837, no less than 1047 ivere made 
by men unable to m-ite. 

These details will enable you to estimate the impudence of the 
following plea in behalf of slavery : 

" It is by the exli^tence of slavery, exempting so large a portion 
of our citizens from tlie necessity of bodily labor, that Ave have 
leisure for intellectual pursuits, and the means of attaining a liberal 
education." — Chancellor Harper of South Carolina on Slavery, 
— Southern Literary Messenger, Oct. 1838. 

Whatever may be the leisure enjoyed by the slaveholders, they 
are careful not to afford the means of literary improvement to 
their fellow-citizens who are too poor to possess slaves, and who 
are, by their very ignorance, rendered more fit instramonts for 
doing the will, and guarding the human property of the wealthier 
class. 



•Spe Amcvirnn Alrnannc for 1842, page 226. 



11 



III. INDUSTRY AND ENTERPRISE. 

In a community so imonlightened as yours, it is a matter of 
course, that the arts and sciences must languish, and the industry 
and enterprise of the country be oppressed by a general torpor. 
Hence multitudes will be Avithout regular and profitable employ- 
ment, and be condemned to poverty and numberless privations. 
The very advertisements in your newspapers show that, for a vast 
proportion of the comforts and conveniences of life, you are de- 
pendent on Northern manufacturers and mechanics. You both 
know and feel that slavery has rendered labor disgraceful among 
you ; and where this is the case, industry is necessarily dis- 
couraged. The great staple of the South is cotton ; and we 
have no desire to undervalue its importance. It, is however, 
worthy of remark, that its cultivation affords a livelihood to only 
a small proportion of the free inhabitants ; and scarcely to any 
of those we are now addressing. Cotton is the product of slave 
labor, and its profits at home are confined almost exclusively to 
the slaveholders. Yet on account of this article, we hear frequent 
vaunts of the agricultural riches of the South. With the ex- 
ception of cotton, it is difficult to distinguish your agricultural pro- 
ducts arising from slaves, and from free labor. But admitting, 
what we know is not the fact, that all the other productions of 
the soil are raised exdusii'dy by free labor, we learn from the 
census, that the agricultural products of the North exceed those 
of the South, cotton excepted, ^226,219,714. Here then we 
have an appalling proof cff the paralyzing influence of slavery on 
the industry of the whites. 

In every communit}' a large portion of the inhabitants are de- 
barred from drawing their maintenance directly from the cultiva- 
tion of the earth. Other and lucrative employments are reserved 
for them. If the slaveholdei's chiefly engross the soil, let us see 
how you are compensated by the encouragement afforded to 
mechanical skill and industiy. 

In 1839 the Secretary of the Treasury reported to Congress, 
that the tonnage of vessels built in the United States was 120,988 
Built in the slave States and Territories 23,600 

Or less than one-fifth of the whole ! But the difference is still 
more striking, when we take into consideration the comparative 
value of the shipping built in the two regions : 

In the free States the value is $6,311,805 

In the slave do. 704,291* 

See Amevicnn Almanac for 1843, page 153. 



12 

It would be tedious and unprofitable to compare the results of 
the different branches of manufacture carried on at the North 
and the South. It is sufficient to state that, according to the 
census, the value of the manufactures 

In the free States are $334,189,690 

In the slave States 83,935,T42 

Having already compared Ohio and Kentucky in reference to 
population and education, we will pursue the comparison as to 
agricultural and mechanical industry. On account of contiguity, 
and similarity of extent, soil and climate, no two States can per • 
haps be so aptly contrasted for the purpose of illustrating the 
influence of slavery. It should also be borne in mind that Ken- 
tucky can scarcely be called a cotton State, having in 1840 
raised only 607,456 lbs. of that article. Hence the deficiency of 
agriculture and other products in Kentucky arises, not from a 
pecuhar species of cultivation, but solely from the withering effects 
of slavery. 

Ohio. Kentucky. 

Wool, 3,685,315 lbs. 1,786,842 

Wheat, 16,571,661 bushels 4,803,152 

Hav, 1,022,037 tons 88,306 

Fulling mills, 205 5 

Printing-offices, 159 34 

Tanneries, 862 387 

Commercial houses ) ^ o 

m foreign trade, j 
Value of machinery [ ^g^ .3^ ^ ^^ 

manufactured, \ ' 

In one species of manufacture the South apparently excels the 
North, but unfortunately it is in appearance only. Of 9657 dis- 
tilleries in the United States, no less than 7665 were found in the 
slave States and Territories ; but for want of skill and capital 
these yield 1992 gallons less than the other. 

Where there is so much ignorance and idleness, we may well 
suppose that the inventive faculties will be but little exercised ; 
and accordingly we find that of the 545 patents granted for new 
inventions in 1846, only 80 were received by the citizens of the 
slave States. We have thus, fellow-citizens, offered you the tes- 
timony of figures, as to the different state of society under freedom 
and slavery ; suffer us now to present you pictures of the two 
regions, drawn not by abolitionists, but by Southem artists, in 
unguarded hours. Mr. Clowney, of South Carolina, thus por- 
trayed his native State, in the ardor of debate on the floor of 
Conorress : 



13 

" Look at South Carolina now, with her liouses deserted and 
falling to decay ; her once fruitful fields worn out and abandoned 
for want of timely improvement or skilful cultivation ; and her 
thousands of acres of inexhaustible lands, still promising an abun- 
dant harvest to the industrious husbandman, lying idle and ne- 
glected. In the interior of the State where I was born, and 
where I now live, although a country possessing all the advan- 
tages of soil, climate and health, abounding in arable land, unre- 
claimed from the first rude state of nature, there can now be 
found many neighborhoods where the population is too sparse to 
support a common elementary school for children. Such is the 
deplorable condition of one of the oldest members of this Union, 
that dates back its settlement more than a century and a half, 
while other States, born as it were but yesterday, already sur- 
pass what Carolina is or ever has been, in the happiest and 
proudest day of her prosperity." 

This gentleman chose to attribute the decline of South Caro- 
lina to the tarift'; rather than to the obvious cause, that one-half 
of the PEOPLE of South Carolina are poor, ignorant, degraded 
SLAVES, and the other half suffering in all their faculties and ener- 
gies, from a moral pestilence which they insanely regard as a 
blessing and not a curse. Surely it is not owing to the tariff, that 
this ancient member of the Union has 20,G15 white citizens 
over twenty years of age Avho do not know their letters ; while 
Maine, with double her population, has only 3,241. 

Now look upon a ver}^ different picture. Mr. Preston, of South 
Carolina, not long since delivered a speech at Columbia in refer- 
ence to a proposed rail-road. In this speech, in order to stimu- 
late the efforts of the friends of the road, he indulged in the 
following strain : 

" No Southern man can journey (as he had lately done) 
through the Northern States, and witness the prosperity, the 
industr}^, the public spirit which they exhibit — the sedulous cul- 
tivation of all those arts by which life is rendered comfortable 
and respectable — without feelings of deep sadness and shame as 
he remembers his own neglected and desolate home. There, no 
dwelling is to be seen abandoned — not a farm uncultivated. 
Every person and every thing performs a part towards the grand 
result ; and the whole land is covered with fertile fields, with 
manufactories, and canals, and rail-roads, and edifices, and towns, 
and cities. We of the South are mistaken in the character of 
these people, when we think of them only as pedlars in horn flints 
and bark nutmegs. Their energ}"- and enterprise are directed to 
all objects great and small within their reach. The number of 



14 

rail-roads and other modes of expeditious intercommunication knit 
the whole country into a closely compacted mass, through which 
the productions of commerce and of the press, the comforts of 
life, and the means of knowledge, are universally diffused ; while 
the close intercourse of tra^•el and of business makes all neigh- 
bors, and promotes a common interest and a common sympathy. 
How different the condition of these things in the South ! Here 
the face of the country wears the aspect of premature old age 
and decay. No improvement is seen going on, nothing is done 
for posterity. No man thinks of anything beyond the present 
moment." 

Yet this same Mr. Preston, thus sensitiv'ely alive to the supe- 
perior happiness and prosperity of the free States, declared in 
the United States Senate, " Let an abohtionist come within the 
borders of South Carolina, if we can catch him we will try him, 
and notwithstanding all the interference of all the governments of 
the earth, including the Federal Government, we will hang 
him."* In other words, the slaveholders, rather than part with 
their slaves, are ready to murder, with all the formalities of law, 
the very men who are laboring to confer on them the envied 
blessings of the North. 

IV. FEELINGS OF THE SLAVEHOLDERS TOWARDS 
THE LABORING CLASSES. 

Whenever the great mass of the laboring population of a 
country are reduced to beasts of burden, and toil under the lash, 
" bodily labor," as Chancellor Harper expresses it, must be dis- 
reputable, from the mere intluence of association. Hence you 
know v^Jiite laborers at the South are styled " mean whites." At 
the North, on the contrary, labor is regarded as the proper and 
commendable means of acquiring wealth ; and our most influential 
men would in no degree suffer in public estimation, for holding 
the plougli, or even repairing the highways. Hence no poor man 
is deterred from seeking a livelihood by honest labor from a dread 
of personal degradation. The different light in which labor is 
viewed at the North and the South is one cause of the depression 
of industry in the latter. 

Another cause is the ever-wakeful jealousy of your aristoci'acy. 
They fear the teople ; they are alarmed at the very idea of 
power and influence being possessed by any portion of the com- 

* We are well aware that Mr. Preston has denied, what no one as- 
serted, that he had said an abolitionist, if he came into South Carolina, 
would be executed by Lynch law. lie used tlie words we have quoted. 
(See " New Vork Journal of Commerce," Jan. 6th, 1838). 



15 

munity not directly interestod in slave property. Visions of 
emancipation, of agrarianism, and of popular resistance to their 
authority, are ever floating in their distempered and excited ima- 
ginations. They know their own weakness, and are afraid you 
should know it also. Hence it is their policy to keep down the 
"mean whites." Hence their philippics against the lower classes. 
Hence their constant comparison of the laborers of the North, 
with their own slaves ; and hence, in no small degree, the absence 
among you of those institutions which confer upon the poor that 
knowledge which is 2yoiver. Do you deem these assertions un- 
charitable ? Listen to their own declarations : 

"We believe the servitude which prevails in the South far 
preferable to that of the North, or in Europe. Slaver}' will exist 
in all communities. There is a class which may be nominally 
free, but they will be virtually Slaves."— Mississip2nan, July Gth, 
1838. 

" Those who depend on their daily labor for their daily sub- 
sistence can never enter into political afl'airs ; they never do, never 
will, never can." — B. W. Leif/h in Virginia Convention, 1829. 

"All society settles down into a classitication of capitalists and 
laborers. The former will own the latter, either collectively 
through the government, or individually in a state of domestic 
servitude, as exists in the Southern States of this confederacy. If 
LABORERS ever obtain the political power of a country, it is in 
fact in a state of revolution. The capitalists north of Mason and 
Dixon's line, have precisely the same interest in the labor of the 
country, that the capitalists of England ha^e in their labor. 
Hence it is that they must have a strong federal government (!) 
to control the labor of the nation. But it is precisely the reverse 
with us. We have already not only a right to the proceeds of 
our laborers, but we own a class of laborers themselves. But let 
me say to gentlemen who represent the great class of capitalists 
in the North — beware that you do not drive us into a separate 
system ; for if you do, as certain as the decrees of heaven, you 
will be compelled to appeal to the sword to maintain ^/ourselves 
at home. It may not come in your day ; but your children's 
children will be covered with the blood of domestic factions, and 
^v\\\ see a j^lii'itderinc/ mob contend inr/ for power and conquest." — • 
Mr. Pickens, of South Carolina, in Congress, 2lst Jan., 1836. 

So the way to prevent plandcrinf/ mobs, is to enslave the 
poor ! We shall see presently, how far this expedient has been 
successful in preventing munlering mobs. 

" In the very nature of things there must be classes of persons 



16 

to discharge all the ditferent offices of society, from the highest 
to the lowest. Some of these offices are regarded as degrading, 
although they must and will be performed. Hence those mani- 
fest forms of dependent ser\ itude which produce a sense of supe- 
riority in the masters or employers, and of inferiority on the part 
of the servants. Where these offices are performed by members 
of the 2^olitical community, a daxgerous element is obviously 
introduced into the body politic. Hence the alarming tendency 
to violate the rights of property by agrarian legislation, which is 
beginning to be manifest in the older States, where universal suf- 
frage j^rera^Ys withOiit DOMESTIC SLAVERY. 

" In a word, the institution of domestic slavery supersedes the 
necessity of an order of nobility, and all the other appen- 
dages OF A HEREDITARY SYSTEM OF GOVERNMENT." Govemor 

M'Duffies Message to the South Carolina Legislature, 1836. 

"We regard slavery as the most safe and stable basis for free 
institutions in the world. It is impossible with us, that the con- 
flict can take place between labor and capital, which makes it so 
difficult to establish and maintain free institutions in all wealthy 
and highly civilized nations where such institutions do not exist. 
Every plantation is a little community with the master at its 
head, who concentrates in himself the united interests of capital 
and labor, of vihich he is the common representative." — (Mr. Cal- 
houn, of South Carolina, in the U. S. Senate, Jan. 10th, 1840.) 

" We of the South have cause now, and shall soon have great- 
er, to congratulate ourselves on the existence of a population 
among us, which excludes the Populace which in effect rules 
some of our Northern neighbors, and is rapidly gaining strength 
wherever slaver}^ does not exist — a populace made up of the 
dregs of Europe, and the most worthless portion of the native 
population." — {Richmond Whig, 1837.) 

" Would you do a benefit to the horse or the ox by giving him 
a cultivated understanding, a fine feeling ? So far as the mere 
LABORER has the pride, the knowledge, or the aspiration of a free- 
man, he is unfitted for his situation. If there are sordid, servile, 
laborious offices to be performed, is it not better that there should 
be sordid, servile, laborious beings to perform them ? 

" Odium has been cast upon our legislation, on account of its 
forbidding the elements of education being communicated to 
slaves. But in truth what injury is done them by this ? He who 
ivorks during the day with his hands, does not read in the inter- 
vals of leisure for his amusement, or the improvement of his 
mind, or the exception is so very rare as scarcely to need the be- 
ing provided for." — (Chancellor Harper of South Carolina, — 
Sout/iern Literary Messenger.) 



17 

This same gentleman delivered an oraticn on the 4th of July, 
1840, reviewing the principles of the two great political parties, 
and although he supported Mr. Van Buren's administration, in 
consideration of its devotion to the slave interest, he frankly in- 
quires : — 

" Is there anything in the principles and opinions of the 
great democratic rabble, as it has been justly called, which 
should induce tis to identify ourselves with that ? Here you 
may find every possible grade and hue of opinion which has 
ever existed in the country. Here you may find loafer, and loco 
foco, and agrarian, and all the rabble of the city of New York, 
the most corrupt and depraved of rabbles, and which controls, in 
a great degree, the city itself, and through that, as being the 
commercial metropolis, exercises much influence over the State 
at large. 

" What are the essential principles of democracy as distinguish- 
ed from republicanism ? The first consists in the dogma, so 
portentous to us, of the natural equality and unalienable right to 
liberty of every human being. Our allies (!) no doubt, are will- 
ing si 2)resent to modify the doctrine in our favor. But the spirit 
of democracy at large makes no such exceptions, nor will these 
(our allies, the Northern democrats) continue to make it, longer 
than necessity or interest may require. The second consists in 
the doctrine of the divine right of majorities ; a doctrine not less 
false, and slavish, and absurd, than the ancient doctrine of the di- 
vine right of kings." 

Mr. Robert WicklifFe, of Kentucky, in a speech published in 
the Louisville Advertiser, in opposition to those who were adverse 
to the importation of slaves from the States, thus discourseth : 

" Gentlemen wanted to drive out the black population, that 
they may obtain white negroes in their place. White negroes 
have this advantage over black negroes, they can be converted 
into voters ; and the men who live upon the sweat of their brow, 
and pay them but a dependent and scanty subsistence, can, if able 
to keep ten thousand of them in employment, come up to the 
polls and change the destiny of the country. 

" How improved will be our condition when we have such 
white negroes as perform the servile labors of Europe, of Old 
England, and he would add now of New England ; when our 
body servants and our cart drivers and our street sweepers are 
white negroes instead of black. Where will be the independence, 
the proud spirit, and the chivalry of Kentuckians then?" 

Had the gentleman looked across the river, he might have 



18 

found au answer to his question, in tlie wealth, power, intelligence 
and happiness of Ohio. 

In reading the foregoing extracts, it is amusing to observe how 
adroitly the slaveholders avoid all recognition of any other classes 
among them than masters and slaves. Who would suspect from 
their language, that they were themselves a small minority of the 
white inhabitants, and that their OAvn " white negroes " could, if 
united and so disposed, outvote them at the polls '? It is worthy 
of remark that in their denunciations of the jpojmldce, the rabhle, 
those who work with their hands, they refer not to complexion, but 
to condition ; not to slaves, but to the poor and laborious of their 
own color. It is these haughty aristocrats wIkj tind in Northern 
democrats "allies," who in Congress and out of it are zealous in 
obeying their mandates, and who may justly be termed their 
" white negroes." 

Slavery, although considered by Mr. Calhoun " the most stable 
basis of free institutions in the world," has, as we shall presently 
show you, in fact, led to grosser outrages in the social compact, to 
more alarming violations of constitutional libert}-, to more bold 
and reckless assaults upon " free institutions," than have ever 
been even attempted by the much-dreaded agrarianism of the 
North. 

V. STATE OF RELIGION. 

The deplorable ignorance and want of industry at the South, 
together with the disrepute in which honest industry is held, can- 
not but exercise, in connection with other causes, a most unhap- 
py influence on the morals of the inhabitants. You have among 
you between two and three millions of slaves, who are kept by 
law in brutal ignoiance, and who, with few exceptions, are vir- 
tually heathens.* 

You ha\e also among you more than 200,000 frco negroes, 
thus deseribed by Mr. Clay : — " Contaminated themn 1 ver-, they 
extend their vices to all around them."f 

If evil communications corrupt good manners, the intimate in- 
tercourse of the wdiiteswith these people must be depraving: nor 
can the exercise of despotic power by the masters, their wives 



* " From long continucJ anil close obscvvatiou, wc beliove lli.it tlicir 
(the slaves') moral ajul religions conilition 's s^uch that they may justly 
ho considere.l the Heathkn of Uiis Christian country, and will bear 
comparison -with heathen in any country in the world. The negroes 
are destitute of the Gos-pel, and ever will be under the present state of 
things." — Report pnbas/ted by tke Si/nod of SoiU/i CaroHnu and Georgia, 
Dec. 8, 188-'l. 

t Speech, before tke American Co'.om~aiion Socivty. 



19 

and children be otherwise tlian unfavorable to the benevolent af- 
fections. 

It is with pain we are compelled to add, that the conduct and 
avowed sentiments of the Soutliei-n clergy in relation to Slavery, 
necessarily exert an unhappy influence. Most of the clergy are 
themselves slaveholders, and are thus personally interested in the 
system, and are consequently bold and active in justifying it from 
Scripture, representing it as an institution enjoying the divine 
sanction. An English author, in reference to these efforts of your 
clergy, forcibly remarks : " Whatever may have been the unut- 
terable wickedness of slavery in the West Indies, there it never 
was baptized in the Redeemer's hallowed name, and its corrup- 
tions were not concealed in the garb of religion. Tliat acme of 
piratical turpitude was reserved for the professed disciples of 
Jesus in America." And well has John Quincy Adams said, 
" The spirit of slavery has acquired not only an overruling ascen- 
dency, but it has become at once intolerant, prescriptive, and 
sophistical. It has crept into the philosophical chairs of the 
schools. Its cloven hoof has ascended the pulpits of the churches 
— professors of colleges teach it as a lesson of morals — ministers 
of the Gospel seek and profess to find sanctions for it in the Word 
of God." 

Your ministers live in the midst of slavery, and they knoiv that 
the system on which they bestow their benedictions, is, in the 
language of Wilberforce, "a system of the grossest injustice, of 
the most heathenish irreligion and immorality ; of the most un- 
precedented degradation and unrelenting cruelty." Surely, we 
have reason to fear that the denunciation of Sciiptarc against 
false prophets of old, will be accomplished against the Southern 
clergy, " Because they ministered unto them before their idols, 
and caused the House of Israel to fall into iniquity, tlierefore have 
I lifted up mine hand against them, saith the Lord God, and they 
shall bear their iniquity." — Ezek. 44 : 12, 

Under such ministrations it cannot be expected that Christian 
zeal and benevolence will take deep root and bear very abundant 
fruit. This is a subject on which few statistics can be obtained. 
We have no means of ascertaining the number of churches and 
ministers throughout the United States of the various denomina- 
tions. Some opinion, however, may be formed of the religious 
character of a people, by their efforts for the moral improvement 
of the community. In the United States there are numerous 
voluntary associations for religious and benevolent purposes, re- 
ceiving large contributions and exercising a wide moral influence. 
Now, of all the large benevolent societies professing to promote 
fhe welfare of the whole country, and asking and receiving con- 



20 

tributions from all parts of it, we recollect but one that had its 
origin in the slave region, and the business of which is transacted 
in it, and that is the American Colonization Society. Of the 
real object and practical tendency of this Society it is unnecessary 
to speak — you understand them. 

In the 10th Report of the American Sunday School Union 
[p. 50] is a table showing the number of Sunday School scholars 
in each State for the year 1834. From this table we learn that 

There were in the free States, . . . 504,835 scholars, 
slave " .... 82,532 

The single State of New York had . . 161,708 
about twice as many as in the thirteen slave States ! 

And is it possible that the literary and religions destitution you 
are suffering, together Avith the vicious habits of your colored 
population, should have no effect on the moral character of the 
whites '? 

We entreat your patient and dispassionate attention to the re- 
marks and facts we are about to submit to you on the next sub- 
ject of inquiry. 

VI. STATE OF MORALS. 

Christianity, by controlling the malignant passions of our na- 
ture, and exciting its benevolent affections, gives a sacredness to 
the rights of others, and especially does it guard human life. 
But where her blessed influence is withdrawn, or greatly impair- 
ed, the passions resume their sway, and violence and cruelty be- 
come the characteristics of every community in which the civil 
authority is too feeble to afford protection. 

No society is free from vices and crime, and we well know that 
human depravity springs from another source than slavery. It 
will not, however, be denied that circumstances and institutions 
may check those evil propensities to Avhich we are all prone ; and 
it will, we presume, be admitted that in forming an opinion of the 
moral condition and advancement of any community, we are to 
be guided in our judgment, not by insulated facts, but by the 
tone of 2)ublic opinion. Atrocities occur in the best regulated 
and most virtuous States, but in such they excite indignation and 
are visited with punishment ; while in vicious communities they 
are treated with levity and impunity. 

In a country where suffrage is universal, the representatives 
will but reflect the general character of their constituents. If 
we are permitted to apply this rule in testing the moral condition 
of the South, the result will not be favorable. 

In noticing the public conduct of pubhc men, we are not sen- 



2^ 

sible of violating any principle of courtes}' or delicacy ; we tonch 
not their private character or their private acts ; we refer to their 
language and sentiments, merely as one indication of the standard 
of morals among their constituents, not as conclusive proof apart 
from other evidence. 

On the loth February, 1837, R. M. Whitney was arraigned 
before the House of Representatives for contempt in refusing to 
attend when required before a Committee. Hisapologj^ was that 
lie was afraid of his life, and he called, as a witness in his behalf, 
one of the Committee, Mr. Fairticld, since Governor of the State 
of Maine. It appeared that in the Committee, Mr. Peyton of 
Virginia had put some interrogatory to Whitney, who had re- 
turned a written answer which was deemed offensive. On this, 
as Mr. Fairfield testified, Peyton addressed the Chairman in these 
terms, " Mr. Chairman, I wish you to inform this witness, that he 
is not to insult me in his answers : if he does, God damn him ! I 
will take his life on the spot !" Whitney rose and said he claimed 
the protection of the Committee, on which Peyton exclaimed, 
" God damn yovi, you shan't speak, you shan't say one word 
while you are in this room, if you do I will put you to death !" 
Soon after, Peyton observing that Whitney was looking at him, 
cried out, " Damn him, his eyes are on me — God damn him, he is 
looking at me — he shan't do it — damn him, he shan't look at me !" 

The newspaper reports of the proceedings of Congress, a 
few years since, informed us that Mr. Dawson, a member from 
Louisiana, went up to Mr. Arnold, another member, and said 
to him, " If you attempt to speak, or rise from your seat, sir, 
by God I'll cut your throat !" 

In a debate on the Florida Avar, Mr. Cooper having taken of- 
fence at Mr. Giddings of Ohio, for some remarks relative to 
slavery, said in his reply, " If the gentleman from Ohio will come 
among my constituents and promulgate his doctrines there, he will 
find that Lynch law will be inflicted, and that the gentleman will 
reach an elevation which he little dreams of." 

In the session of 1841, Mr. Payne, of Alabama, in debate, 
alluding to the abolitionists, among whom he insisted the Post- 
master-General ought to be included, declared that he would pro- 
scribe all abolitionists, he " would put the brand of Cain upon 
them — yes, the mark of Hell, and if they came to the South he 

would HANG THEM LIKE DOGS !" 

Mr. Hammond, of South Carolina, at an earlier period thus 
expressed himself in the House : " I Avarn the abolitionists, 
ignorant, infatuated barbarians as they are, that if chance shall 
throw any of them into our hands, they may expect a felon's 

DEATH !" 



22 

Tn 1848, Mr. Hale, a Senator from New Hampshire, introduced 
a bill for the protection of property in the District of Columbia, 
attempts having been made to destroy an anti-Slavery press. Mr. 
Foote, a Senator from Mississippi, thus expressed himself in 
reply: "I invite him (Mr. H.) to the State of Mississippi, and 
will tell him before-hand, in all honesty, that he could not go ten 
miles into the interior, before he would grace one of the tallest 
trees of the forest, with a lope around his neck, with the appro- 
bation of every virtuous and patriotic citizen, and that, if neces- 
sary, I SHOULD MVSELF ASSIST IN THE OPERATION." 

And now, fellow-cifizens, do these men, with all their profanity 
and vulgarity, breathing out threatenings and slaughter, represent 
the feelings, and nranners, and morals of tlie slaveholding com- 
munity ? We have seen no evidence that they have lost a parti- 
cle of popular favor in consequence of their ferocious violence. 
Alas ! their language has been re-echoed again and again by pub- 
lic meetings in the slave States ; and we proceed to Liy before 
you overwlielniing proof tliat in the expression of their murder- 
ous feelings towards the abolitionists, they have faithfully repre- 
sented the sentiments of their constituents. 

VII. DISREGARD FOR HUMAN LIFE. 

We have already seen that one of the blessings which the 
slaveholders attribute to their favorite institution, is exemption 
from popular tumults, and from encroachments by the democracy 
upon the rights of })roperty. Their argument is, that political 
power in the hands of the poor and laboring classes is always attend- 
ed with danger, and that this danger is averted when these classes 
are kept in bondage. With these gentlemen, life and liberty seem 
to be accounted as the small dust of the balance, when weighed 
against sla\eiy and plantations ; hence, to preserve the latter 
they are ever readv to sacrifice the former, in utter defiance of 
laws and constitutions. 

We have already noticed the murderous proposition in relation 
to abolitionists, made by Governor M'Duffie to the South Carolina 
Legislature in 1835 : " It is my deliberate opinion that the laivs 
of every ccjmmunitv should punish this sjiecies of interference, 
by DEATH without benefit of clergy." In an address to a legis- 
lative assembly, Governor M'Duflie refrained from the indecency 
of recommending Ule<ial murder ; but we will soon find that the 
public sentiment of the South by no means requires that aboli- 
tionists shall be put to death with legal formalities ; but on the 
contrary, the slaveholders are readv, in the language of Mr. Payne, 
to " hang them like dog?." 



Wo hazard llulo ju tho assertion, that in no civilized Christian 
community on earth is human life less protected by law, or more 
frequently taken with impunity, than in the slave States of the 
Federal Union. We Avish to impress upon you the danger and 
corruption to Avhich you and your children are exposed from the 
institution, which, as we have shown you, exists by your suffer- 
ance. But you have been taught to respect this institution ; 
and hence it becomes necessary to enter into details, however 
painful, and to present you with authorities which you cannot re- 
ject. What we have just said of the insecurity of human life, 
Avill probably be deemed by you and others as abolition slander. 
Listen, then, to slaveholders themselves. 

" We long to see the day," said the Governor of Kentucky in 
his message to the Legislature, 1837, "when the law will assert 
its majesty, and stop the wanton destruction of life which almost 
daibj occurs within the jurisdiction of tliis commonwealth. Men 

SLAUGHTKR EACH OTHER WrrU ALMOST PERFECT IMPUNITY. A 

species of common law has grown up in Kentucky, which, were it 
written down, would, in all civilized countries, cause her to be 
re-christened, in derision, the land of blood." 

The present Bishop of the Episcopal Church in Kentucky* a 
few years since, published an article on the murders in that State. 
He states that some with whom he had conversed, estimated 
them at 80 per annum ; but that he had rated them at about 
30 ; and that he had ascertained that for the last three years, 
there had not been '•' an instance of capital punishment in any 
^vhite offender." " It is believed," says he, " there are more 
homicides on an average of two j'ears in any of oiu* more popu- 
lous counties, than in the whole of several of our States of equal, 
or nearly equal, population to Kentucky." 

Governor McVay, of Alabama, in his message to the Legisla- 
ture, November lo, 1S37, thus speaks, "We hear of homicides 
in different parts of the State continually, and yet have few con- 
victions and still fewer executions ! Why do we hear of stab- 
bings and shootings almost daihj in some part or other of our 
State ?" 

" Death by Violence. — The moral atmosphere in our State 
appears to be in a deleterious and sanguinary condition. Almost 
every exchange paper which reaches us, contains some inhuman 
and revolting ease of murder, or death by violence. N^ot less than 
FIFTEEN deaths by violence have occurred, to our certain know- 
ledge, -within the past thi-ee months." — Grand Gulf Miss. Ad- 
vertiser, 21 th June, 18S1 . 

* It is believed this gentleman is not a slaveholder 



24 

Contempt of Human Life. — In viow of the crimes which are 
daily committed, we are led to inquire whether it is owing to the 
inefficiency of our laws, or to the manner in which these laws are 
administered, that this frightful deluge of human blood 

FLOWS through OUR STREETS AND OUR PLACES OF PUBLIC RESORT. 

— Neio Orleans Bee, 1'id May, 1838. 

At the opening of the Ciiminal Court in New Orleans, Novem- 
ber 4th, 1837, Judge Lansuque delivered an address, in which, 
speaking of the prevalence of violence, he used the following lan- 
guage : 

"As a Louisiana parent, I reflect with terror, that our be- 
loved children, reared to become one day honorable and useful 
citizens, may be the victims of these votaries of vice and licen- 
tiousness. Without some powerful and certain remedy, our 
streets will become butcheries, overflowing with the blood of 

OUR CITIZENS !" 

While the slaveholders are terrified at the idea of the " great 
democratic rabble," and rejoice in human bondage as superseding 
the necessity of " an order of nobility, and all the appendages of 
a hereditary government," they have established a reign of terror, 
as insurrectionary and as sanguinary in principle, as that created 
by the sans culottes of the French revolution. We indulge in no 
idle declamation, but speak the words of truth and soberness. 

A public meeting, copvened in the church! ! in the town of 
Clinton, Mississippi, 5th September, 1835 — 

Resolved, '• That it is our decided opinion, that any individual 
who dares to circulate, with a view to eftectuate the designs of 
the abolitionists, any of the incendiary tracts or newspapers now 
in the course of transmission to this country, is justly Avortliy. in 
the sight of God and man, of immediate death; and we doubt 
not that such would be the punishment of any such offender, in 
any part of the State of Mississippi where he may be found." 

It would b<^ tedious (o copy the numerous resolutions of similar 
import, passed by public meetings in almost every slave State. 
You well know that the promoters of those lawless and san- 
guinary proceedings, did not belong to the "rabble" — they 
were not " mean whites," but )ich, inlluential slaveholders. A 
meeting was held in 1835 at Williamsburgh, Virginia, which was 
hai-angued by no less a personage than John Tyler, once 
Governor of the State, and since Preaident of the TTnited States : 
under this gentleman's auspices, and after his address, the meet- 
in,"- resolved — 



25 

" That we regard the printing and circulating within our limits, of 
incendiary pubUcations, tending to excite our slaves to insurrection 
and rebellion, as treasonable acts of the most alarming character, 
and that w^ien we detect offenders in the act, we will inflict 
upon them condign punishment, without resorting to any other 
tribunal." 

The profligacy of this resolution needs no comment. Mr. Ty- 
ler well knew that the laws of Virginia, and every other State 
were abundantly sufiicient to punish ciime : but he and his fellow 
lynchers wished to deter the people from receiving and reading 
anything adverse to slavery ; and hence, with their usual audaci- 
ty, they determined to usurp the prerogative of courts and juries, 
and throw down all the bulwarks which the law has ei'ected for 
the protection of innocence. 

Newspapers are regarded as the mirrors of public opinion. 
Let us see what opinions are reflected in those of the South. 

The. Charleston Courier, lltli August, 1835, declared that 
" the gallotvs and the stake " awaited the abolitionists who should 
dare to " appear in pei-son among us." 

" The cry of the whole South should be death, instant death 
to the abolitionist, wherever he is caught." — Augusta {Geo.) 
Chronicle. 

" Let us declare through the public journals of our country, 
that the question of slavery is not and shall not be open to dis- 
cussion ; that the system is too deep-routed among us, and must 
remain for ever ; that the very moment anj^ private individual at- 
tempts to lecture us upon its evils and immorality, and the neces- 
sity of putting means in operation to secure us from them, in the 
same moment his tongue shall be cut out and cast upon the 
dunghill." — Colnmbia {S.C.) Telescope. 

This, it will be noticed, is a threat addressed, not to the Northern 
abolitionists, but to t/oti, fellow-citizens, to the grcat majority of 
the white inhabitants of the South ; and you are warned not to 
express an opinion offensive to your aristocracy. 

"Awful but Just Punishmext. — We learn, by the arrival of 
the steamboat Kentucky last evening from Richmond, that Robin- 
son, the Englishman mentioned in the Beacon of Saturday, as be- 
ing in the vicinity of Lynchburg, was taken about fifteen miles 
from that town, and hanged on the spot, for exciting the slaves 
to insurrection." — Norfolk {Va.) Beacon, 10th August, 1835. 

"We can. assure the Bostonians, one and all, who have em- 
barked in the nefarious scheme of abolishing slavei-y at the South, 



26 

that lushes will hereafter be spared the backs of their emissaries. 
Let them send out their men to Louisiana ; they will never return 
to tell tlieir sufferings, but they shall expiate the crime of inter- 
fering with our domestic institutions, by being burned at the 
STAKE." — New- Orleans True American. 

" Abolition editors in slave States will not dare to avow their 
opinions. It would be instant death to them." — Missouri Arc/us. 

Here, again, is a threat directed against any oiyou, who may 
happen to have the command of types and printer's ink. 

Now, w^e ask what must be the state of society, where the 
pubUc journals thus justify and stimulate the public thirst for 
blood ? The very idea of trial is scouted, and the mob, or rather 
the slaveholders themselves, are acknowledged to be the arbiters 
of life and death. The question we put to you as to the state of 
society, has been already answered by the official declarations of 
the Governors of Kentucky and Alabama, an"d of Judge Lansu- 
que, of New Orleans ; as well as by the extracts we have given 
you from some of the southern journals, relative to the frequency 
of murders among them. We could farther answer it, by filling 
sheets with accounts of fearful atrocities. But we purposely re- 
frain from referring to assa^:sinations and private crimes ; for such, 
as already remarked, occur in a greater or less degree in every 
community, and do not necessarily fonn a test of the standard 
of morals. But we ask your attention to a test which cannot be 
(juestioned. We will present for your consideration a series of 
atrocities, perpetrated, not by indi\iduals in secret, but in open 
day by the slavtholdiwj populace. 

We have seen that two of the Southern papers we have quoted, 
threaten abolitionists with the stake. This awful and horrible 
punishment has been banished, by the progress of civiUzation^ 
from the whole of Christeudum, with the single exception of the 
American Slave States. It is scarcely necessary to say, that 
even in them, it is unknown to the laws, although familiar to the 
people. It is also deserving of remark, that the two journals 
wliich have made this atrocious threat were published, not among 
the rude borderers of our frontier settlements, but in the popu- 
lous cities of Charleston and New-Orleans, the very centres of 
Southern refinement. 

"TrscALOOSA (Alab.) June 20, 182'7, The negro [one who 
had killed a Mr. M'Neilly] was tiiken before a Justice of the 
Peace, who waived his authority, perhaps through fear, as a 
crowd of persons had collected, to the number of seventy or 
eighty, near Mr. People's [the Justice] house. He acted as Pr©- 



27 

sident of the mob, and put the vote, when it was decided that he 
should be immediately executed by being burned to death. The 
sable culprit was led to a tree and tied to it, and a large quantity 
of pine knots collected and placed around him, and the fatal torch 
applied to the pile, even against the remonstrances of several 
gentlemen who were present, and the miserable being was in u 
short time burned to ashes. This is the second negro who has beeu 
thus put to death, without judge or jury in this countxy." 

On the 28th of April, 1836, a free negro was arrested in St. 
Louis (Missouri) and committed to jail on a charge of murder. 
A mob assembled and demanded him of the jailor, who surren- 
dered him. The negro was then chained to a tree a short dis- 
tance fro7n the Court House, and burned to death. 

" After the flames had surrounded their prey, and when his 
clothes were in a blaze all over him, his eyes burnt out of his 
head, and his mouth seemingly parched to a cinder, some one in 
the crowd, more compassionate than the rest, proposed to put an 
end to his misery by shooting him, when it was replied that it 
would be of no use, since he was already out of his pain. ' No,* 
said the wretch, ' I am not, I am suffering as much as ever ; shoot 
me, shoot me.' ' No, no,' said one of the fiends who was stand- 
ing about the sacrifice they were roasting, ' he shall not be shot, 
I would sooner slacken the fire, if that would increase his misery ;' 
and the man who said this was, we understand, an oj^cer of juS' 
ticc.' ' — Alton Tclef/raph . 

" We have been informed that the slave William, who murdered 
his master (Huskey) some weeks since, was taken by a party a 
few days since /row the Sheriff oi Hot Sjiring, and burned alive! 
yes, tied up to the limb of a tree and a fire built under him, and 
consumed in a slow lingering torture." — Arkansas Gazette, Oct. 
29. 1836. 

The Natchez Free Trader, \Qth June, 1842, gives a horrible 
account of the execution of the negro, Joseph, on the 5th of that 
month for murder. 

" Tb.e body," says that paper, " was taken and chained to a tree 
immediatel)' on the bank of the Mississippi, on what is called 
Union Point. The torches were lighted and placed in the pile. 
He watched unmoved the curling flame as it grew, until it began 
to entwine itself around and feed upon his body ; then he sent 
forth cries of ngonv pninful to the ear, begging some one to blow 
his brains out ; at the same time siu-ging with almost superhuman 
strength, until the staple with which the chain was fastened to 
the tree, not being well secured, drew out, and he leaped from 



28 

the buiTiing pile. At that moment the sharp ring of several 
rifles -was heard, and the body of the negro fell a corpse to the 
ground. He was picked up by two or three, and again thrown 
into the fire and consumed." 

"Another Negro Burned. — We learn from the clerk of the 
Highlander that, Avhile wooding a short distance below the mouth 
of Red river, they were invited to stop a short time and see ano- 
ther negro burned."— N. 0. Bulletin. 

Thus we see that burning negroes aUve is treated as a specta- 
cle, and strangers are invited to witness it. The victim of this 
exhibition was the negro Enoch, said to have been an accompHce 
of Joseph, and was burned a few days after the other. 

We have thus given you no less than six instances of human 
beings publicly burned alive in four slave States, and in each case 
with entire impunity to the miscreants engaged in the horrible 
murder. But these were cases which happened to be reported in 
the newspapers, and with which we happened to become ac- 
quainted. There is reason to believe that these executions are 
not of rare occurrence, and that many of them, eitlier through 
indifl;erence or policy, are not noticed in the Southern papers. 

A recent traveller remarks, " Just before I reached Mobile, two 
men were burned alive there in a slow tire in the open air, in the 
presence of the gentlemen of the city. No word was breathed of 
the transaction in the newspapers."-J/ar;i«ca({'s Society in 
America, vol. i., p. 373. 

But the murderous spirit deplored I))' the Governors of Ken- 
tucky and Alabama, and the " frightful deluge of human blood" 
complained of by the New Orleans editor, had no leference to the 
murder of negroes. Men who can enjoy the sight of negroes 
wiithing in flames, and are permitted by the civil authorities to 
indulge in sucli exhibitions, will not be very scrupulous in taking 
the lives of each other. You well know how incessantly the 
work of human slaughter is going on among you ; and no reader 
of your public j<jurnals can be ignorant of the frequent occurrence 
of your deadly street fights. But, for the reason already given, 
we meddle not with these. We charge the slaveholding commu- 
nity, as such, with sanctioning murder, and protecting the perpe- 
trators, and setting the laws at defiance. This we know is a 
grievous charge, and most grievous the proof of it. But mistake 
not our meaning. God foi'bid we should deny that man}' of the 
community to which we refer, utterly abhor the atrocities we are 
about to detail. We speak of the murderous feelings of the 
slaveholding community, just as we speak of the politics, the 
manners, and tlie morals of any other community, freely acknow- 



29 

ledging tliat there are numerous and honorable exceptions. For 
the general truth of our assertion, we appeal to the authorities 
and tlie facts we have already laid before you, and to those we 
are about to offer. 

You have already seen tliat the pro-slavery press has recom- 
mended the murder of such northern abolitionists as may be 
caught in the Soutli ; we now ask your attention to the efforts made 
by the slaveholders to get prominent abolitionists into their power. 

In 1831, a citizen of Massachusetts established a newspaper 
at Boston, called the Liberatoi-, and devoted to the cause of negro 
emancipation. The undertaking was perfectly legal, and he him- 
self, having never been in Georgia, had of course violated none 
of her laws. The legislature, however, forthwith passed a law, 
offering a bribe of 85000 to any person who would arrest and 
and bring to trial and conviction, in Georgia, the editor and pub- 
lisher of the Boston paper. This most atrocious law was " ap- 
proved" on the 26th Dec, 1831, by William Lumpkin, the 
Governor. The object of the bribe could have been no other 
than the abduction and murder of the conductor of the paper — 
his trial and conviction under Georgia laws being a mere pretence : 
the Georgia couils have as much jurisdiction over the Press in 
Paris as in Boston. A Lynch court was the only one that could 
have taken cognizance of the offence, and its proceedings would 
imdoubtedly have been both summary and sanguinary. 

The horrible example thus set by the Georgia Legislature was 
not without its followers. 

At a meeting of slaveholders at Sterling, Sept. 4, 1835, it was 
formally recommended to the Governor to issue a proclamation, 
offering the $5000 appropriated by the Act of 1831, as a reward 
for the apprehension of either of ten persons named in the reso- 
lution, citizens of New York and Massachusetts, and one a sub- 
ject of Great Britain ; not one of whom it was even pretended 
had ever set his foot on the soil of Georgia. 

The Milledgeville [6^a.] Federal Union, of Feb. 1, 1836, con- 
tained an offer of $10,000 for kidnapping A. A. Phelps, a cler- 
gyman residing in the city of New York. 

The Committee of Vigilance of the Parish of East Feliciana, 
offered in the Louisiana Journal of 15th Oct., 1835, 850,000 to 
any person who would deliver into their hands Arthur Tappan, a 
New York merchant. 

At a public meeting of the citizens of Mount Meigs, Alabama, 
13th August, 1836, the Honorable [!] Bedford Ginress in tlie 
chair, a reward of |50,000 was offered for the apprehension of 
Arthur Tappan, or Le Roy Sunderland, a clergyman of the 
Mf'thodist Church residing in New York. 



30 

Let us now Arittu^ss the practical operation of that murderous 
spirit which dicuited the t'oiegoing vilUiinous bribes. We have 
ah-eady seen the conduct of the blave-holding community to negro 
offenders ; we are now to notice its tender mercies to men of its 
own color. 

In 1835, there was a real or affected apprehension of a 
servile insurrection in the State of Mississippi. The slaveholders, 
as usual on such occasions, were exceedincrlr fiitrhtcned, and 
were exceednigly cruel. A pamphlet was afterwards pub- 
lished, entitled " Proceedinfis of the Citizens of Madison County, 
Miss., at Livingston, in J>dy, 1835, in relation to the trial 
and punishnievt of several individuals implicated in a con- 
templated insurrection in this State. — Prepared hy Thomas 
Shuckelford, Esqvire. Printed at Jackson, Mi>iS.'" This pamph- 
let, then, is the Southern account of the affair; and while it is 
more minute in its details than the narratives published in the 
newspapers at the time, we are not aware that it contradicts 
them. It may be regarded as a sort of semi-official repoit put 
forth by the slaveholders, and published under their implied sanc- 
tion. It appears, from this account, that in consequence of " ru- 
mors" that the slaves meditated an insurrection — that a colored 
girl had been heard to say that " she was tired of waiting on the 
white folks — wanted to be her own mistress for the balance of 
her days, and clean up her own house, tVc," a meeting was held 
at which resolutions were signed, organizing a committee, and 
authorizing them ''to briny before them any person or 2)crsons, 
either rvhite or black, and try in a summary manner any person 
hro^iyht before them, with ^xnner to hang or rvhip, being always 
gonerned by the Icnvs of the land, so far only as they shall be ap- 
plicable to the case in question ; otherwise to act as in their discretion 
shall seem best for the benefit of the country and the protection o/ 
its citizens." 

This was certainly a most novel mode of erecting and commis- 
sioning a Court of judicature, with the power of life and death, ex- 
pressly authorized to act independently of " the laws of the land." 
The Constitution of the State of ^lississippi, which no doubt 
many of the honorable Judges of the Court had on other occa- 
sions taken an oath to support, contains the following clause : — 
"No person shall be accused, arrested or detained, except in 
cases ascertained bv law, and according to the fonus which the 
same has prescribed ; and no person shall be punished, but in vir- 
tue of a law established and promulgated prior to the offence, 
and legally applied." 

Previo7is to the organization of this Court, five slaves had al- 
ready been uvko bv the people. The Court, or rathei-, as it was 



SI 

modestly called b}- the meeting who erected it, " the committee," 
proceeded to try Dr. Joshua Cotton, of New England. It was 
proved to the satisfaction of the committee that he had been de- 
tected in many low tricks — that he was deficient in feeling and af- 
fection for his second wife — that he had traded with negroes — 
that he had asked a negro boy whether the slaves were whipped 
much, how he would like to be free ? (fee. It is stated that Cotton 
made a confession that he had been aiming to bring about a con- 
spiracy. The committee condemned him to be hangkd in an 

HOUR AFTER SENTEXCE. 

William Saunders, a native of Tennessee, was next tried. He 
was convicted " of being often out at night, and giving no satis- 
factory explanation for so doing" — of equivocal conduct — of be- 
ing intimate with Cotton, &c. Whereupon, by a unanimous vote, 
he was found guilty and sentenced to be hung. He was exe- 
cuted with Cotton on the 4th of July. 

Albe Dean, of Connecticut, was next tried. He was convicted 
of being a lazy, indolent man, having very little pretensions to 
honesty — of " pretending to make a living by constructing wash- 
ing machines" — of " often coming to the owners of runaways, to 
intercede Avith the masters to save them from a whipping." He 
was sentenced to be hung, and was executed. 

A. L. Donavan, of Kentucky, was then put on his trial. He 
was suspected of ha\ing traded with the negmes — of being found 
iu their cabins, and enjoying himself in their Society. It was 
proved that " at one time he actually undertook to release a 
negro who was tied, which negro afterwards implicated him," 
and that he once told an overseer " it was cruel work to be 
whipping the poor negroes as he was obliged to do." The com- 
mittee were satisfied, from the evidence before them, that Dona- 
van was an emissary of those deluded fanatics of the North, 
the abohtionists. He was condemned to be hung, and suffered 
accordingly. 

Ruel Blake was next tried, condemned and hung. " He pro- 
tested his innocence to the last, and said his life was sworn 
away." 

Here we have a record of no less than ten men, five black 
and five white, probably all innocent of the crime alleged against 
them, deliberately and publicly put to death by the slaveholders, 
without the shadow of legal autliority. 

The Maysville, Ken. Gazette, in announcing Donavan's mur- 
der, says, " he formerly belonged to Jilaysville, and was a much 
respected citizen." 

A letter from Donavan to his wife, written just before his 
execution, and published in the Maysville paper, says, " I am 



32 

doomed to die to-morrow at 12 o' clock, on a charge of ha^^ng 
been concerned in a negro insurrection, in this State, among 
many other whites. We are not tried by a regular jury, but 
by a committee of planters appointed for the purpose, Avho have 

not time to wait on a person for evidence Now I must 

close by saying, before my Maker and Judge, that I go into his 
presence as innocent of this charge as when I Avas born .... 
I must bid you a final farewell, hoping that the God of the 
widow and the fatherless will give you grace to bear this most 
awful sentence." 

And now, did these butcheries by the Mississippi planters 
excite the indication of the slaveholdint; communities ? Receive 
the answer from an editor of the Ancient Dominion, replying to 
the comments of a Northern newspaper. " The Journal may 
depend upon it that the Cottons and the Saunders, men con- 
fessing themselves guilty of inciting and plotting insurrection, 
will be HANGED UP Avherever caught, and that ivithout the forma- 
lity of a legal trial. Northern or Southern, such will be their 
inevitable doom. For our part, we applaud the transaction, and 
none in our opinion can condemn it, who have not a secret sym- 
pathy with the Garrison sect. If Northern sympathy and effort 
are to be cooled and extinguished by such cases, it proves but 
this, that the South ought to feel little confidence in the profes- 
sions it receives from that quarter." — Richmond Whig. 

About the time of the massacre in Clinton County, another 
awfid tragedy was performed at Vicksburg in the same State, 
Five men, said to be gamblers, were hanged by the mob on the 
5th July, in open day. 

The Louiuana Advertiser, of 13th July, says, "These unfortu- 
nate men claimed to the last, the privilege of American citizens, the 
trial by Jury, and professed themselves Avilling to submit to any- 
thing their country would legally inflict upon them : but we are 
sorry to say, their petition was in vain. The black musicians 
were ordered to strike up, and the voices of the supplicants were 
drowned by the fife and drum. Mr. Riddle, the Cashier of the 
Planters' Bank, ordered them to play Yankee Doodle. The 
unhappy sufferers frec^uently implored a drink of water, but they 
vjere ref'sed." 

The sympathy of the Louisiana editor, so different from his 
brother of Richmond, was probably owing to the fact, that the 
murdered men were accused of being gamblers, and not aboli- 
tionists. 

When we said these five men were hung by the mob, we did 
not mean what Chancellor Harper calls " tlie democratic rabble." 
It seems the Cnsliier of a R:uik. a man to whom the slaveholders 



33 

entrust the custody of their money, officiated on the occasion as 

Master of Ceremonies. 

A few days after the murders at Vicksburg, a negro named 
Vincent was sentenced by a Lynch chib at Clinton, Miss., to 
receive 300 lashes, for an alleged participation in an intended 
insurrection. We copy from the Clinton Gazette. 

" On Wednesday evening Vincent was carried out to receive 
his stripes, but the assembled multitude were in favor of hang- 
ing him. A vote was accordingly fairly taken, and the hanging 
party had it by an overwhelming majority, as the politicians say. 
He was remanded to prison. On the day of execution a still 
larger crowd was assembled, and fearing that the public sentiment 
might have changed in regard to his fate, after eveiything favor- 
able to the culprit was alleged vrhich could be said, the vote was 
taken, and his death icas demanded bg the people. In pursuance of 
this sentiment, so unequivocally expressed", he was led to a black 
jack and suspended to one of its branches — we approve en- 
tirely OF THE proceedings J THE PEOPLE HAVE ACTED PRO- 
PERLY." 

Thus, SIXTEEN human beings were deliberately and publicly 
murdered, by assembled crowds, in different parts of the State of 
Mississippi, within little more than one week, in open defiance of 
the laws and Constitution of the State. 

And now we ask, what notice did the chief magistrate 
of Mississippi, sworn to support her Constitution, sworn to execute 
her laws — what notice, we ask, did he take of these horrible 
massacres ? Why, at the next session of the Legislature, Gov- 
ernor Lynch, addressing them in reforence to abolition, remarked, 
" Mississippi has given a practical demonstration of feeling on 
this exciting subject, that may serve as an impressive admonition 
to offenders ; and however we may regret the occasion, we are 
constrained to admit, that necessity will sometimes prompt a sum- 
mary mode of trial and punishment unknown to the law." 

The iniquity and utter falsehood of this declaration, as applied 
to the transactions alluded to, are palpable. If the victims Avere 
innocent, no necessity required their murder. If guilty, no ne- 
cessity required their execution contrary to law. There was no 
difficulty in securing their persons, and bringing them to triai. 

In 1841, an unsuccessful attempt was made in Kentucky to 
murder a man. The assailants Avere arrested and lodged in jail 
for trial. Their fate is thus related in a letter by an eye-witness, 
published in the Cincinnati Gazette : — 



34 

" Williamstown , Ky., July 11, 1841. 
" The unfortunate men, Lyman Couch and Smith Maythe, were 
taken out of jail on Saturday about 12 o'clock, and taken to the 
ground where they committed the horrid deed on Utterback, and 
at 4 o'clock were hung on the tree where Utterback lay when 
his throat was cut. The jail was opened by force. I suppose 
there were from Foun to seven hundred people engaged in it. 
Resistance was all in vain. There were three speeches made to 
the mob, but all in vain. They allowed the prisoners the privi- 
lege of clergy for about five hours, and then observed that they 
had made their peace with God, and they deserved to die. The 
mob was conducted with coolness and order, more so than I ever 
heard of on such occasions. But such a day was never wit- 
nessed in our little village, and I hope never will be again." 

The fact that this atrocity was perpetrated in " our little vil- 
lage," and by a rural population, affords an emphatic and hon-ible 
indication of the state of morals in one of the oldest and best of 
our slave States. 

Would that we could here close these fearful narratives ; but 
another and more recent instance of that ferocious laAvlessness which 
slavery has engendered, must still be added. The following facts 
are gathered from the Norfolk (Va.) Beacon of 19th Nov., 1842. 

George W. Lore Avas, in April, 1842, convicted in Alabama, 
on circumstantial evidence, of the crime of murder. The Supreme 
Court granted a new trial, remarking, as is stated in another 
paper, that the testimony on which he was convicted was " unfit 
to be received by any court of justice recognizx-d among civilized 
nations." In the mean time, Lore escaped from jail, and was 
afterwards arrested. He was seized by a mob, who put it to 
vote, whether he should be surrendered to the civil authority or 
be Imnrj. Of 132 votes, 130 were for immediate death, and he 
was accordingly iirNO at Spring Hill, Bcnirbon County, on the 
4th November. 

And now, fellow-citizens, what think you of Mr. Calhoun's 
" most safe and stable basis for free institutions ?" Do you 
number trial nv jtry among free institutions ? You see on 
what basis it rests — the will of the slaveholders. You see by 
what tenure you and your children hold your lives. In New 
York, you are told by high Southern authority, " you may find 
loafer, and loco-foco, and agrarian, and the most corrupt and 
depraved of rabbles." But we ask you, where Avould your life 
be most secure if charged with crime, amid the labble of New 
York or that of Clinton, Vicksburg, and Williamstown? We 
think we have fully proved our assertion respecting the disreganl 



of human life felt by the slaveliolding community ; and of course 
their contempt for those legal barriers which are erected for its 
protection. Let us now inquire more particularly how far slavery 
is indeed a stable basis, on wJiich free institutions may securely 
rest. 

VIII. DISREGARD FOR CONSTITUTIONAL OBLIGA- 

TIONS. 

Governor McDuffie, in his speech of 1834 to the South Caro- 
lina Legislature, characterized the Federal Constitution as " that 
miserable mockery of blurred, and obliterated, and tattered 
parchment." Judging from their conduct, the slaveholders, 
while fully concurring with the Governor in his contempt for the 
national parchment, have quite as little respect for their own 
State Constitution and Laws. 

The " tattered parchment" of which Mr. McDuffie speaks, de- 
clares that " the citizens of each State shall be entitled to all the 
privileges and immunities of citizens of the several States." Art. 
IV. Sec. 2. Notwithstanding this express provison, there are in 
almost every slave State, if not in all, laws for seizing, imprison- 
ing, and then selling as slaves for life, citizens having black or 
yellow complexions, entering within their borders. This is done 
under pretence that the individuals are supposed to be fugitives 
from bondage. When circumstances forbid such a supposition, 
other devices are adopted, for nullifying the provision we have 
quoted. By a law of Louisiana, every free negro or mulatto, 
arriving on board any vessel as a mariner or passenger, shall be 
immediately imprisoned till the departure of the vessel, when he 
is to be compelled to depart in her. If such free negro or mu- 
latto returns to the State, he is to be imprisoned for five years. 

The jailor of Savannah some time since reported ten stewards 
as being in his custody. These were free citizens of other States, 
deprived of their liberty solely on account of the complexion 
their Maker had given them, and in direct violation of the express 
language of the Federal Constitution. If any free negro or 
muktto enters the State of Mississippi, for any cause however 
ui'gent, any Avhite citizen may cause him to be punished by the 
Sheriff with thirty-nine laslies, and if he does not immediately 
thereafter leave the State, he is sold as a slave. 

In Maryland, a free negro or mulatto, coming into the State, is 
fined $20, and if he returns he is fined $500, and on default of 
payment, is sold as a slave. Truly indeed have the slaveholders 
rendered the Constitution a blurred, obliterated, and tattered 
pai'cbment. But whenever this same Constitution can, by the 



36 

grossest peryer.sion, be made instrumental in upliolcling and per- 
petuating human bondage, then it acquires, for the time, a mar- 
vellous sanctity iu their eyes, and they are seized with a holy 
indignation at the very suspicion of its profanation. 

The readiness with which Southern Go\ernors prefer the most 
false and audacious claims, luider color of Constitutional autho- 
rity, exhibits a state of society in which truth and honor are but 
little respected. 

In 1833, seventeen slaves effected their escape from Virginia 
in a boat, and finally reached New York. To recover their slaves 
as such, a judicial investigation in New York would be necessary, 
and the various claimants would be required to prove their pro- 
perty. A more convenient mode presented itself. The Governor 
of Virginia made a requisition on the Executive of New York for 
them as fugitive /t/oM.S', and on this requisition, a warrant was is- 
sued for their arrest and surrender. The pretended felony was 
stealing the boat iu which they had escaped. 

In 1839, a slave escaped from Virginia on board of a vessel 
bound to New York. It Avas suspecied, but without a particle of 
proof, that some of the crew had favored his escape ; and imme- 
diately the master made oath that three of the sailors, naming 
them, had feloniously stolen the slave ; and the Governor, well 
knowing there was no slave-market in New York, and that no 
man could there be held in slavery, had the hardihood to de- 
mand the surrender of the mariners, on the charge of grand lar- 
ceny ; and, in his correspondence with the Governor of New 
York, declared the slave was worth six or seven hundred dollai'S, 
and remarked that stecdiwj w%as " recognized as a ckime by all 
laws, human and divine." 

In 1841, a female slave, belonging to a man named Flournoy, 
in Georgia, was discovered on board a vessel about to sail for 
New York, and was recovered by ber master. It was afterwards 
supposed, from the woman's story, that she had been induced by 
one of the passengers to attempt her escape. Whereupon Flour- 
noy made oath that John Greenman did feloniously steal his 
slave. But the Governor of New York had already refused to 
surrender citizens of bis State, on a charge so palpably false and 
absurd. It was therefore deemed necessaiy to trump up a very 
different charge against the accused ; and hence Flournoy made 
a second affidavit, that John Greenman did feloniously steal and 
take away three blankets, two shuiuls, three frocks, one 'pnir of ear- 
rings, and tivo jinger-rinrjs, thep^'operti/ofdejjonent. Armed with 
these affidavits, the Governor demanded the surrender of Green- 
man under the Constitution. Not an intimation was given by His 
Excellencv, when he made the demand, of the real facts of the 



case, which, ia a subsequent correspondence, he was compelled 
to admit. It turned out that the woman, instead of being stolen, 
went voluntarily, and no doubt joyfully, on board the vessel ; and 
that the wearing apparel, &c., were the clothes and ornaments 
worn by her ; nor was there a pretence that Greenman had ever 
touched them, or ever had them in his possession. 

In 1838, Rev. John B. Mahan, a Methodist preacher, residing 
in Ohio, was reported to have given aid and shelter to fugitive 
slaves from Kentucky, and forthwith the Grand Jury of Mason 
County, in that State, indicted him, as being " late of the County 
of Mason," for aiding two slaves in making their escape from said 
county. On the strength of this indictment. Governor Clark, of 
Kentucky, issued his requisition on the Governor of Ohio, Avherein 
he stated that the said Malian " has Jlcd from justice, and is now 
r/oinff at large in the State of Ohio ;" and that by virtue of the au- 
thority vested in liim by the " Constitution and Laws of the 
United States, he did demand the said John B. Mahan, as a fugi- 
tive from the justice of the laws of this State." On this requisition 
Mahan was seized, carried into Kentuck}'^, put in irons, and kept 
in prison as a felon for about ten weeks, when, after a trial which 
lasted six da3's, he was acquitted by the jury. Now it was a 
matter of notoriety, and admitted hy the prosecution, that Mahan 
had not been in Kentucky for about twenty years! ! Yet day 
after day was spent in endeavors to procure the conviction of a 
man who had committed no offence against the laws of the State, 
and whose person liad been seized in consequence of a gross 
fraud, and a palpable and acknowledged falsehood. But how 
happened it that the slaveholders permitted their prey to escape ? 
Fortunately for Mahan, the Governor of Ohio, after surrendering 
him, discovered the imposition that had been practised, and offi- 
cially informed the Governor of Kentucky, that he could not con- 
sent thnt a citizen of Ohio should be taken to another State, and 
tried for an oflence not committed within her jurisdiction. The 
publicntion of this letter drew the attention of the community to 
the infamous outrage that had been practised. If, after this, 
Mahan had been I^ynched, or even judicially punished, a contro- 
versy would have arisen between the two States, which would 
necessarily have given new strength and influence to the anti- 
slavery cause. 

But perhaps the most insolent attempt yet made to pervert the 
Federal Constitution to the support of slavery, was the expedient 
de\'ised in Alabama to muzzle the Northern press. An article 
appeared in a newspaper published in New York, in 1835, which 
gave offence to certain planters in that State ; and forthwith a 
grand jvuy, on their oaths, indicted the New York publisher. 



88 

" late of the County of Tuscaloosa," for eiideavoring to excite 
insurrection among the slaves, by circulating a seditious paper ; 
and on this indictment the Governor had the impudence to make 
a formal requisition for tlie surrender of the publisher, as 2l fugi- 
tive from justice, although he had never breathed the air of 
Alabama. 

We have said that the slaveholders hold their ovm laws and 
Constitutions in the same contempt as those of the Federal Go- 
vernment, whenever they conflict with the security and perma- 
nency of slaverj'. One of the most inestimable of constitutional 
privileges is trial by jury ; and this, as we have seen, is tram- 
pled under foot with impunity, at the mandate of the slave- 
holders. Even Joiix Tyler, as it appears, is for inflicting 
summary punishment on abolitionists, by a Lynch club, " with- 
out resorting to any other tiibunal." 

We now proceed to inquire how far they respect the liberty of 
speech and of the press. 

IX. LIBERTY OF SPEECH. 

The whole nation witnessed the late successful efforts of the 
slaveholders in Congress, by their various gag resolutions, and 
(hrOLigh the aid of recreant Northern politicians, to destroy all 
freedom of debate adverse to " the peculiar institution." They 
■were themselves ready to dwell, in debate, on the charms of human 
bondage ; but when a member took the other side of the question, 
then, indeed, he was out ol order, the constitution was outraged, and 
the Union endangered. We all know the vicilent threats which 
have been used, to intimidate the friends of human rights from 
expressing their sentiments in the national legislature. "As 
long," savs Governor McDuffle to the South Carolina Legislature, 
" as long as the halls of Congress shall be open to the discussion 
of this question, we can ha^•e neither peace nor security." The 
Charleston Mercury is, on this subject, very high authority ; and 
in 1837 its editor announced that " Public opinion in the South 
would now, we are sure, justify an immediate resort to force by 
the Southern delegation, even on the vloor of Congress, were 
they forthwith to skize and drag from the hall any man who 
dared to insult them, as that eccentric old showman, John Quincy 
Adams has dared to do." 

When so much malignity is manifested against the fi-eedora of 
speech, in the very sanctuary of American liberty, it is not to be 
supposed that it will be tolerated in the house of bondage. We 
have already quoted a Southern paper, which declares that the 
moment " any private individual attempts to lecture us on the 



39 

evils and immorality of slavciy, that very moment his tongue 
shall be cut out and cast upon the dunghill." 

In Marion College, Missouri, there appeared some symptoms 
of anti-slavery feeling among the students. A Lynch club as- 
sembled, and the Rev. Dr. Ely, one of the professors, appeared 
before them, and denounced abolition, and submitted a series of 
resolutions passed by the faculty, and among them the following : 
" We do hereby forbid all discussions and pubHc meetings among 
the students upon the subject of domestic slavery." Tiie Lynch- 
ers were pacified, and neither tore down the college nor hung up 
the professors ; but before separating they resolved that they would 
oppose the elevation to office of any man entertaining abolition 
sentiments, and would withhold their countenance and support 
from every such member of the community. Indeed, it is obvious 
to any person attentive to the movements of the South, that the 
slaveholders dread domestic far more than foreign interference 
with their darling system. They dread yon, fellow-citizens, and 
they dread converts among themselves. 

X. LIBERTY OF THE PRESS. 

The Constitutions of all the slave States guarantee, in the most 
solemn and explicit terms, the Libert;,^ of the Press ; but it is 
well understood that thei-e is one exception to its otherwise un- 
bounded license — Property in human flesh is too sacred to be as- 
sailed by the press. The attributes of tlie Deity may be dis- 
cussed, but not the rights of the master. The characters of 
public, and even of private men, may be vilified at pleasure, 
provided no reproach is flung upon the slaveholder. Every 
abuse in Church or State may be ferreted out and exposed, ex- 
cept the cruelties practiced upon the slaves, unless when they 
happen to exceed the ordinary standard of cruelty established 
by general usage. Every measure of policy may be advocated, 
except that of free labor ; every question of right may be ex- 
amined, except that of a man to himself ; every dogma in the- 
ology may be propagated, except that of the sinfulness of the 
slave code. Tlie very instant the press ventures bevond its pre- 
scribed limits, the conf^titutional harriers erected for its protection 
sink into the dust, and a censorship, the more stern and vindictive 
from beincr iUeijal, crushes it into submission. The midnijrht 
burglary perpetrated upon the Charleston Post-office, and the 
conflagration of the anti-slavery papers found in it, are well 
known. These papers had been sent to distinguished citizens, 
but it was deemed inexpedient io permit them to.reM facts and 
arguments against slavery. Pains will be taken to prevent you 



40 

from reading tliis address, and vast pains have been taken to keep 
slaveholders as well as others ignorant of every fact and argu- 
ment that militates against the system. Hence Mr. Calhoun's 
famous bill, authorizing every Southern post-master to abstract 
from the mails every ])aper relating to slavery. Hence the insane 
efforts constantly made to expurgate the literature of the Avorld 
of all recognition of the rights of hlack men. Novels, annuals, 
poems, and histories, containing sentiments hostile to human 
bondage, are proscribed at the South, and Northern publishers 
have had the extreme baseness to publish mutilated editions for 
the Soutliern market.* 

In some of the slave States laws have been passed establishing 
a censorship of the press, for the exclusive and special benefit of 
the slaveholders. Some time since an anti-slavery pamphlet was 
mailed at New York, directed to a gentleman in Virginia. Pre- 
sently a letter was received from William Wilson, post-master at 
Lexington, Va., saying — 

" I have to advise you that a law passed at the last session of 
the Legislature of this State, which took effect on the first day 
of this month, makes it the duty of the post-masters or their 
assistants to report to some magistrate (under penalty of from 
$50 to $200), the receipt of all such pubUcations at his office ; 
and if, on examination, the magistiate is of opinion they come 
under the provision of the law, it is his duty to have them "burnt 
in his presence — which operation ^vas performed on the above men- 
tioned pamphlet this morning.'" 

The Rev. Robert J. Breckenridge, a well-known zealous oppo- 
nent of aboHlion, edited, in 1835, "The Baltimore Rehgious 
Magazine." A number of this magazine contained an article 
from a correspondent, entitled " Bible-Slavery." The tone of 
this article not suiting the slave-breeders of Petersburg (Virg.), 
the subscribers were deprived of the numbers forwarded to them 
through tlie post-office of that town. The magazines were taken 
from the Office, and on the Sth May, 1838, were burnt in the 
street, before the door of the public reading-room, in the presence 
and by the direction of the Mayor and Recorder ! ! 

It is surely unnecessary to remark, that this Virginia law is in 



* The Harpers, of New York, iu reply to a letter from tlie South, com' 
plaining of the anti-slavery sentiments in a book thej' had recently pub- 
lished, stated, " since the receipt of your letter we have published an 
edition of the ' Woods and Fields,' in which the offevsive. matter has been 
omiUed," 



41 

contemptuous violation of the Constitution of Virginia, and of the 
authority of the Federal Government. The act of Congress 
requires each post-master to deUver the papers Avhich come to his 
office to the persons to whom they are directed, and they require 
him to take an oath to fulfil his duty. The Virginia law imposes 
duties on an officer over whom they have no control, utterly at 
variance with his oath, and the obligations under which he as- 
sumed the office. If the postmaster must select, under a heavy 
penalty, for a public bonfire, all papers bearing on slavery, why 
may he not be hereafter required to select, for the same fate, all 
papers hostile to Popery ? Yet similar laws are now in force in 
various slave States. 

Not only is this espionage exercised over the mail, but mea- 
sures are taken to keep the community in ignorance of what is 
passing abroad in relation to slavery, and Avhat opinions are else- 
where held respecting it. 

On the 1st of August, 1842, an interesting address was deli- 
vered in Massachusetts, by the late Dr. C banning, in relation to 
West India emancipation, embracing, as was natural and proper, 
reflections on American slaver3\ This address was copied into a 
New York weekly paper, and the number containing it was of- 
fered for sale, as usual, bj^ the agent of the periodical at Charles- 
ton. Instantly the agent was prosecuted by the South Carolina 
Association, and was held to bail in the sum of $1,000, to answer 
for his CRIME. Presently after, this same agent received for sale 
a supply of " Dickens' Notes on the United States," but having 
before his eyes the fear of the slaveholders, he gave notice in the 
newspapers, that the book would " be submitted to highly intelli- 
gent members of the South Carolina Association for inspection, 
and IF the sale is approved by them, it will be for sale — if not, 
not." And so the popidation of one of the largest cities of the 
slave region were not permitted to read a book they were all 
burning with impatience to see, till the volume had been first in- 
spected by a self-constituted board of censors ! The slaveholders, 
however, were in this instance afraid to put their power to the 
test — the people might have rebelled if forbidden to read the 
"Notes," and hence one of the most powerful, effective anti- 
slavery tracts yet issued from the press was permitted to be cir- 
culated, because people loould read what Dickens had written. 
Surely, fellow- citizens, you v/ill not accuse us of slander, when 
we say that the slaveholders have abolished among you the 
liberty of the press. Remember the assertion of the editor of the 
Missouri Argus : " Abolition editors in the slave States will not 
dare to avow their opinions : it would be instant death to 
them." 



42 

Xr. MILITARY WExVKNESS. 

A distinguished foreigner, after travelling in the Southern 
States, remarked that tlie very aspect of the country bore testi- 
mony to the temerity of the nuUitiers, who, defenceless and ex- 
posed as tliey are, could not dare to hazard a civil war ; and 
surely no people in the world have more cause to shrink from an 
appeal to arms. We find at the South no one element of military 
strength. Slavery, as we have seen, checks the progress of po- 
pulation, of the arts, of enterprise, and of industrv. But above 
all, the laboring class, which in other countries affords the mate- 
rials of wliich armies are composed, is regarded among you as 
your most deadly foe ; and the sight of a thousand negroes with 
arms in their hands, would send a thrill of terror through the 
stoutest hearts, and excite a panic which no number of the vete- 
ran troops of Europe could produce. Even now, laws are in 
force to keep arms out of the hands of a population which ought 
to be your reliance in danger, but which is your dread by day 
and night, in peace and war. 

During our revolutionary war, when the idea of negro emanci- 
pation had scarcelj^ entered the imagination of any of our citizens 
— when there were no " fanatic abolitionists," no " incendiary 
publications," no " treasonable " anti-slavery associations ; in 
those palmy days of slavery, no small portion of the Southern 
militia Avere withdrawn from the defence of the country to pro- 
tect the slaveholders from the vengeance of their own bondmen ! 
This you would be assured was abolition slander, were not the 
fact recorded in the national archives. The Secret Jovrnal of 
Congress (Vol. I., p. 105) contains the following remarkable and 
instructive record : — 

"March 2dfh, 1'779. — The Committee appointed to take into 
consideration the circumstances of the Southern States, and the 
ways and means for their safety and defence, report. That the 
State of South Carolina (as represented by the delegates of the 
said State, and by Mr. linger, who has come hither at the re- 
quest of the Governor of said State, on purpose to explain the 
particular circumstances thereof,) is unable to make any effectual 
efforts with militia, by reason of the great proportion of citizens 
necessary to remain at home, to prevent insurrection ainong the 
negroes, and to prevent the desertion of them to the enemy. 
That the state of the country, and the great number of these 
people among them, expose the inhabitants to great danger, from 
the endeavors of the enemy to excite them to revolt or desert." 

At the first census, in ITOO, eleven years after this report, and 



43 

when the slaves had unquestionably greatly increased their num- 
bers, they -were only 101,094: fewer than the whites. If, then, 
these slaves exposed their masters " to great danger," and tlie 
militia of South Carolina were obliged to stoT/ at. home to protect 
their families, not from the foreign invaders, but the domestic 
enemies, what would be the condition of the little blustering nul- 
lifying State, with a foreign army on her shores, and .335,000 
slaves ready to aid it, while her own white population, militia 
and all, is but as two whites to tlu-ee blacks ? 

You well know that slaveholders, in answer to the abolitionists, 
are wont to boast of the fidelity and attachment of their slaves ; 
and j'ou also well know, that among themselves they fi-eely avow 
their dread of these same faithful and attached slaves, and are 
fertile in expedients to guard against their vengeance. 

It is natural that we should fear those whom we are conscious 
of having deeply injured, and all history and experience testify 
that fear is a cruel passion. Hence the shocking severity with 
"which, in all slave countries, attempts to shake oft' an unrighteous 
yoke are punished. So late even as 1822, certain slaves in 
C'harleston were svspected of an intention to rise and assert their 
freedom. No overt act was committed, but certain blacks were 
found who professed to testify against their fellows, and some, it 
is said, confessed their intentions. 

On this ensued one of the most horrible judicial butcheries on 
record. It is not deemed necessary, in the chivalrous Palmetto 
State, to give grand and petit juries the trouble of indicting and 
trying slaves, even when their lives are at stake. A court, con- 
sisting of two Justices of the Peace and five freeholders, was con- 
vened for the trial of the accused, and the following were the 
results of their labors : — 

Julv 2 6 hanged, 

"^12 2 

"26 22 

"30 4 " 

August 9 1 " 

Total 35 

Now, let it be remembered, that this sacrifice of human life 
was made by one of the lowest tribunals in the State ; a tribunal 
consisting of two petty magistrates and five freeholders, appointed 
for the occasion, not possessing a judicial rank, nor professing to 
be learned in the law ; in short, a tribunal which would not be 
trusted to decide the title to an acre of ground — we refer not to 
the individuals composing the court, btxt to the court itself; — a 



44 

court which has not power to take away the land of a white man, 
hangs black men by dozens ! 

Listen to the confessions of the slaveholders with regard to 
their happy dependents ; the men who are so contented under 
the patriarchial system, and whose condition might well excite 
the envy of northei-n laborers, " the great democratic rabble." 

Governor Ilayne, in his message of 1833, warned the South 
Carolina Legislature, that '*a state of military preparation must 
always be with us a state of perfect domestic security. A pro- 
found peace, and consequent apathy, may expose us to the dan- 
ger of domestic insurrection." So it seems the happy slaves are 
to be kept from insurrection by a state of military preparation. 
We have seen that, during the revolutionary war, the Carolina 
militia were kept at home watching the slaves, instead of meeting 
the British in the field ; but now it seems the same task awaits 
the militia in a season of profound peace. Another South Caro- 
linian* admonishes his countrymen thus: "Let it never be for- 
gotten that our negroes arc truly the Jacobins of the country ; 
that they are the anarchists, and the domestic enemy, the com- 
mon ENEMY of civilized SOCIETY, AND THE BARBARIANS WHO 
WOULD, IF THEY COULD, BECOME THE DESTROYERS OF OUR RACE." 

Again, " Hatred to the whites, with the exception, in some 
cases, of attachment to the person and family of the master, is 
nearly universal among the black population. We have then a 
FOE, cherished in our very bosoms — a foe willing to draw our 
LIFE-BLOOD whenever the opportunity is offered ; in the mean 
time intent on doing us all the mischief in his power." — Southern' 
Religious Teleffraj^h. 

In a debate in the Kentucky Legislature, in 1841, Mr. Harding, 
opposing the repeal of tlu^ law prohibiting the importation of 
slaves from other States, and looking forward to the time when 
the blacks would greatly out-number the whites, exclaimed : 

" In such a state of things, suppose an insurrection of the slaves 
to take place. The master has become timid and fearful, the 
slave bold and daring — the white men, overpowered with a sense 
of superior numbers on the pait of the slaves, cannot be embo- 
died together; every man must guard his oivn hearth and fireside. 
No man would even dare for an liour to leave his own habitation ; 
if he did, he would expect on his return to find his wife and 
children massacred. But the slaves, with but little more than 



* The author of " A Refutsition of the Calumnies inculcated against 
the Southern and Western States." 



45 

the shadow of opposition before them, armed with the conscious- 
ness of superior force and superior numbers on their side, ani- 
mated with the hope of hberty, and maddened with the spirit of 
revenge, embody themselves in every neighborhood, and furiously 
march over the country, visiting ever}- neighborhood with all the 
horrors of civil war and bloodshed. And thus the yoke would 
be transferred from the black to the white man, and the master 
fall a bleeding victim to his own slave." 

Such are the terrific visions which are constantly presenting 
themselves to the afirighted imaginations of the slaveholders ; 
such the character which, amcnuj themselves, they attribute to 
their own domestics. 

Attend to one more, and that one an extraordinaiy confession : 

" We, of the South, are emphatically surrounded by a danger- 
ous class of beings — degraded and stupid savages, who, if they 
could but once entertain the idea, that immediate and uncondi- 
tional death would not be their portion, would re-act the St. Do- 
mingo tragedy. But a consciousness, with all their stupidity, that 
a ten-fold force, superior in discipline, if uot in harharit;/, would 
gather from the four corners of the United States, and slaughter 
them, keeps them in subjection. But to the non-slaveholding 
States particularly, are we indebted for a permanent safeguard 
against insurrection. Without their assistance, the white popula- 
tion of the South would be too loeak to quiet the innate desire for 
liberty, which is ever ready to act itself out with eveiy rational 
creature." — Maysville Intelligencer. 

And now Ave ask you, fellow-citizens, if all these declarations 
and confessions be tnie — and who can doubt it — what must be 
your inevitable condition, should your soil be invaded by a foreign 
foe, bearing the standard of emaxcipatiox ? 

In perfect accordance with the above confession, that to the 
non-slaveholding States the South is indebted for a permanent 
safeguard against insurrection, Mr. Underwood, of Kentuck}-, 
uttered these pregnant words in a debate, in 1842, in Congress, 
" The dissolution of the Union will be the dissolution of 

SLAVERY." 

The action of the Federal Government is, we know, controlled 
by the slave interest; and what testimony does that action bear 
to the miUtary weakness of the South ? Let the reports of its 
high functionaries answer. 

The Secretary of War, in his report for 1842, remarked, "The 
v.orks intended for the more remote Southern portion of our terri- 
tory, particidarly require attention. Indications are already made of 



46 

designs of the worst character against that region, in the event of 
hostilities from a certain quarter, to wliich we cannot be insensi- 
ble." The Secretary's fears had been evidently excited by the 
organization of black regiments in the British West Indies, and 
the threats of certain English wiiters, that a war between the 
two countries would result in tlie liberation of the slaves. The 
report from the Quarter-Master, General Jessup, a Southern man, 
betrays the same anxiety, and in less ambiguous terms : " In the 
event of a war," says he, " with either of the great European 
powers possessing colonies in the West Indies, thei-e will be dan- 
ger of the peninsula of Florida being occupied by BLACKS from 
the Islands. A proper regard for the security of our Southern 
States requires, that prompt and efficient measures be adopted to 
prevent such a state of things." The Secretaiy of the Navy, a 
slaveholder, hints his fears in cautious circiunlocution. Speaking 
of the event of a war with any considerable maritime power, he 
says, " It would be a war of incursions aimed at revolution. The 
first blow Avould be struck at us through our institutions ;" he 
means, of course, " the peculiar institution." He then proceeds 
to show that the enemy wordd seek success " in arraying, what 
are supposed to be, the hostile elements of our social sijstem 
against each other ;" and he admits, that " even in the best event, 
war on our own soil would be the more expensive, the more em- 
barrassing, and the more iiouraBLE in its effects, by compelling us 
at the same time to oppose an enemy in the field, and to guard 
against all attempts to subvert our social si/stvm.'' In plain lan- 
guage, an invading enemy would strike the first blow at the slave 
system, and thus aim at revolution, — a revolution that would giver 
hberty to two and a half millions of human beings ; and that such 
a war would be veiy embarrassing to the slaveholders, and the 
more horrible, because, as formerly in South Carolina, a lai-ge 
share of their militaiy force would neces'sarily be emploved, not 
in fighting the enemy, but in guarding the social, that is, the 
" patriarchal system." 

No persons are more sensible of their hazardous situation than 
the slaveholders themselves, and hence, as is common with 
people who are secretly conscious of tlieir own Aveakness, they 
attempt to supply the want of strength by a bullying insolence, 
ho[)ing to effect by intimidation what they well know can be ef- 
fected in no other way. This game has long been played, and 
with great success, in Congress. It has been attempted in our 
negotiations with Great Britain, and has signally failed. 

Your aristocracy, whatever may bo their vaunts, are conscious 
of their railiUiry weakness, and shrink from any contest which 
may cause a foreigo army to plant tho standard of emaucipatiou. 



47 

upon their soil. The very idea of an armed negro startles their 
fearful imaginations. This is disclosed on innumerable occasions, 
but was conspicuously manifested in a debate in the Senate. la 
July, 1842, a Bill to regulate enlistments in the naval service be- 
ing under consideration, Mr. Calhoun proposed an amendment, 
that negroes should be enlisted only as cooks and stewards. He 
thought it a matter of ffreat consequence not to admit blacks into 
our vessels of national defence. Mr. Benton thought all arms, 
whether on land or sea, ought to be borne by the white race. 

Mr. Bagby. " In the Southern portion of the Union, the great 
object was to keep arms and a knowledge of arms out of the hands 
of the blacks. The subject addressed itself to eveiy Southern 
heart. Self-preservation was the first law of nature, and the 
South must look to that." 

On the motion of Mr. Preston, the bill was so amended as to 
include the army. 

And think you that men, thus in awe of their own dependents, 
shuddering at a musket in the hands of a black, and with a popu- 
lation of two miUions and a half of these dreaded slaves, will 
expose themselves to the tremendous consequences of a union 
between their domestic and foreign enemies ? Of the four Avho 
voted against the British treaty, probably not one would have 
given the vote he did, had he not known to a certainty that the 
treaty would be ratitied. 

Think not we are dispo!?ed to ridicule the fears of the slave- 
holders, or to question their personal courage. God knows their 
perils are real, and not imaginary : and who can question, that 
v.'ith a hostile British army in the heart of Virginia or Alabama, 
the whole slave region would presently become one -vast scene of 
horror and desolation ? Heretofore the invaders of our soil were 
themselves interested in slave property : now they Avould be zea- 
lous emancipationists, and they would be accompanied by the 
most terrific vision which could meet the eye of a slaveholder, 
regiments of black troops, fully equipped and disciplined. Surely 
such a state of things might well appal the bravest heart, and 
palsy the stoutest arm. But, fellow-citizens, what, in such a 
catastrophe, would be your condition '? Your fate and that of 
your wives and children would then be linked to that of your 
lordly neighbors. One indiscriminate ruin would await you all. 
But you may avert these accumulated horrors. You may change 
two and a half millions of domestic and implacable enemies into 
faithful friends and generous protectors. Ko sooner shall the 
negroes cease to be oppressed, than they will cease to hate. The 
planters of Jamaica were formerly as much afraid of their slaves, 
ae your planters now aro of theirs. But tbo Jamaica slaves, now 



48 

freemen, are no long dreaded ; on the contrary, they form the 
chief military force of the island ; and should a foreign foe 
attack it, "would be found its willing and devoted defenders. 
It rests with you to relieve your country of its most dangerous 
enemy, to render it invulnerable to foreign assaults, and to dissi- 
pate that fearful anticipation of wrath and tribulation, which now 
broods over and oppresses the mind of every white who resides 
in a slave country. 

We have called your attention to the practical influence of 
slavery on various points deeply aflecting your prosperity and 
happiness. These are : 

1. Increase of popidation. 

2. State of education. 

3. Industry and enterprise. 

4. Feeling toward the laboring classes. 
6. State of religion. 

6. State of morals. 

Y. Disregard for human life. 

8. Disregard for constitutional obligations. 

9. Liberty of speech. 
10. Liberty of the press. 
IL Military weakness. 

You will surely agree with us, that in many of these particu- 
lars, the States to which you belong are sunk far below the or- 
dinary condition of civilized nations. The slaveholders, iti their 
listlessness and idleness, in their contempt for the laws, in their 
submission to illegal and ferocious violence, in their voluntary sur- 
render of their constitutional rights, and above all in tlieir disre- 
gard for human life, and their cruelty in taking it. are, as a civil- 
ized and professedly a Christian community, without a parallel, 
unless possibly among some of the anarchical States of South 
America. 

When compelled to acknowledge the superior prospeiiiy of the 
free States, the slaveholders are fond of imputing the difterence 
to tariffs, or to government patronage, or to any other than the 
true cause. 

Let us then inquire, whether the inferior and unhappy condi- 
tion of the slave States can indeed be ascribed to any natural 
disadvantai,'e under which tliey are laboring, or to any partial or 
unjust legislation by the Federal Government? 

In the first place, the slave States cnnnot pretend that they have 
not received their full share of the national domain, and that the 
narrowness of their territoiial limits have retarded tl)e develop- 
ment of their enterprise and resources. The area of the slave 



40 

States is nearly double that of the free. New York has acquired 
the title of the Empire State ; yet she is inferior in size to Vir- 
ginia, Missouri, Georgia, Louisiana, or North Carohna. 

Nor can it be maintained that the free States are in advance 
of the slave States, because from an earlier settlement they had 
the start in the race of improvement. Virginia is not only the 
largest, but the olded settled State in the confederacy. She, 
together with Delavrare, ^Maryland, North Carolina and South 
Carolina, were all settled before Pennsylvania. 

Nor will any slaveholder admit, for a moment, that Providence 
has scattered his gifts with a more sparing hand at the South 
than at the North. The richness of their soil, the salubrity of 
their climate, the number and magnitude of their rivers, are 
themes on which they delight to dwell ; and not imfrequent is 
the contrast they draw between their own fair and sunny land, 
and the ungenial climate and sterile soil of the Northern and 
Eastern States. Hence the moral difference between the two 
sections of our republic must arise from other than natural causes. 
It appears also that this difference is becoming wider and wider. 
Of this fact we could give various proofs ; but let one suffice. 

At the first census in 1790, the free population of the 

present free States and Territories was 1,930,125 

" of the slave States and Territories, 1,394,847 



Difierence, 535,278 
By the last census, 1840, the same population in the 

free States and Territories was 9,782,415 

In the slave States and Territories, 4,793,738 



Difterence, 4,988,677 

Thus it appears that in 1790 the free population of the South 

was 72 per cent, of that of the North, and that in 1840 it was only 

49 per cent.; wliile the difierence in 1840 is more than nine times 

as great as it was in 1790. 

Thus you percei^'e how unequal is the race in which you are 
contending. Fifty years have given the North an increased pre- 
ponderance of about four and a half millions of free citizens. 
Another fifty years will increase this preponderance in a vastly 
augmented ratio. And now we ask you, why this downward 
course ? Why this continually increasing disparity between you and 
your Northern brethren '? Is it because the interests of the slave- 
holders are not represented in the national councils ? Let tis see. 
We have already shown you that your free population is only 49 
per cent, of that of the Northern States ; that is, the inhabitants 



60 

of the free States are more than double the free inhabitants of 
the slave Slates. Now, what is the proportion of members of 
Congress from the two sections ? 

In tlie Senate, the slave States have precisely as many as the 
free ; and in tlie lower House, their members are 65 per cent, of 
those from the free States."* 

The Senate has a veto on every law ; and as one half of that 
body are slaveholders, it follows, of course, that no law can be 
passed without their consent. Nor has any bill passed the Sen- 
ate, since the organization of the government, but by the votes of 
elaveholders. It is idle, therefore, for them to impute their de- 
pressed condition to unjust and partial legislation, since they have 
from the very first controlled the action of Congress. Not a law 
has been passed, not a treaty ratified, but by tlieir votes. 

Nor is this all. Appointments under the federal government 
are made by the President, with the consent of the Senate, and 
of course the slaveholders have, and always have had, a veto on 
every appointment. There is not an officer of the federal gov- 
ernment to whose appointment slaveholding members of the 
Senate have not consented. Yet all this gives but an inadequate 
idea of the political influence exercised by the jKoplc of the slave 
States in the election of President, and consequently over the policy 
of his administration. In consequence of the peculiar apportion- 
ment of Pretridential Electors among the States, and the opera- 
tion of the rule of federal numbers — whereby, for the purpose of 
estimating the representative population, five slaves are counted 
as three white men — most extraordinary results are exhibited at 
every election of President. In the election of 1848, the Electors 
chosen were 290: of these 169 were from the free, and 121 
from the slave States. 

The popular vote in the free States was 2,029,551 

or one elector to 12,007 voters. 
The popular vote in the slave States was 845,050 

or one elector to 7,545 voters. f 

Even this disproportion, enormous as it is, is greatly aggra- 
vated in regard to particular States. 



• 135 from the free and 88 members from the slave States. Accord- 
ing to free population, the South would liave only 66 members. 

I South Carolina had 9 electors, chosen by the Legislature. These 
are deducted in the calculation. 



61 

New York gave 455,761 votes, and luad 36 electors. 
Virginia ) 

Maryland V gave 242,547 " " 36 

N. Carolina ) 

Ohio gave 328,489 " " 28 " 

Delaware "| 
Georgia j 
Louisiana j 

Alabama )>gave 237,811 " " 88 " 

Arkansas 
Florida 
Texas 

These facts address themselves to the underetanding of all, 
and prove, beyond cavil, that the slave States have a most unfair 
and unreasonable representation in Congress, and a verj^ dispro- 
portionate share in the election of President. 

Nor can these States complain that they are stinted in the 
distribution of the j^tronage of the national government. The 
rule of federal numbers, confined by the Con.stitution to the 
apportionment of representatives, has been extended, by the influ- 
ence of the slaveholders, to other and very different subjects. 
Thus, the distribution among the States of the surplus revenue, 
and of the proceeds of the public lands, was made according to 
this same iniquitous rule. 

It is not to be supposed that the slaveholders have failed to 
avail themselves of their influence in the federal government. A 
very brief statement will convince you, that if the}' are now feeble 
and emaciated, it is not because they have been deprived of their 
share of the loaves and fishes. 

By law, midshipmen and cadets, at West Point, are appointed 
according to the Federal ratio ; thus have the slaveholders secured 
to themselves an additional number of oflicers in the Army and 
Navy, on account of their slaves. 

Reflect for a moment on the vast patronage wielded by the 
President of the United States, and then recollect, that should 
the present incumbent (General Taylor) serve his full term, the 
office wjU have been filled no less than ffty-hco years out of 
sixty-four by slaveholders !'■'' 

Of 21 Secretaries of State, appointed up to 5th March, 1849, 
only six have been taken from the free States. 

For 37 years out of 60, the chair of the House of Repre- 
sentatives has been filled and its Committees appointed by slave- 
holders. 

* Except one montb by General Harrison. 



52 

Of the Judges of the Supreme Court, 18 have been taken 
from the slave, and but 14 from the free States. 

In 1842, the United States were represented at foreign Courts 
by 19 Ministers and Charges d' Affaires. Of these fat Offices, 
no less than 13 were assigned to slaveholders ! 

Surely, surely, if the South be wanting in every element of 
prosperity — if ignorance, barbarity and poverty be her character- 
istics, it is not because she has not exercised her due influence in 
the general government, or received her share of its honors and 
emoluments. 

PROSPECTS FOR THE FUTURE. 

If, fellow-citizens, with all the natural and political advantages 
we have enumerated, your progress is still downward, and has 
been so, compared with the other sections of the country, since 
the first organization of the Government, what are the anticipa- 
tions of the distant future, which sober reflection authorizes you 
to form ? The causes which now retard the increase of your 
population must continue to operate, so long as slavery lasts. 
Emigrants from the North, and from foreign countries, will, as at 
present, avoid your borders, within which no attractions will be 
found for virtue and industry. On the other hand, many of the 
younw and enterprising among you will flee from the lassitude, 
the anarchy, the wretchedness engendered by slavery, and seek 
their foi'tunes in lands where law affords protection, and where 
labor is honored and rewarded. 

In the meantime, especially in the cotton States, the slaves 
will continue to increase in a ratio far beyond the whites, and will 
at length acquire a fearful preponderance. 

At the first census, in every slave State there was a very large 
majority of whites — now, the slaves out-number the whites in 
South Carolina, Mississippi and Louisiana, and the next census 
will unquestional))y add Florida and Alabama, and probably 
Georgia, to the number of negro States. 

And think you that this is the country, and this the age, in 
which the republican maxim that the majority must govern, can 
be long and barbarously reversed ? Think you that tTie majority 
of the Peoplk in the cotton States, cheered and encouraged as 
they Avill be by the sympatliy of the world, and the example of 
the West Indies, will forever tamely submit to be beasts of bm-- 
den for a few lordly planters ? And remember, avs pray you, 
that the number and physical strength of the negroes will increase 
in a much greater ratio than that of their masters. 



53 

In 1*790 the whites in N. Carolina were to the slaves as 

2.80 to 1, now as 1.97 to 1 
" S. Carolina, " 1.31 to 1, " .79 to 1 

" Georgia, " 1.76 to 1, " 1.44 to 1 

« Tennessee, " 13.35 to 1, " 3.49 to 1 

" Kentucky, " 5.16 to 1, " 3.23 to 1 

Maryland and Virginia, the great breeding States, have re- 
duced their stock within the last few years, having been tempted, 
by high prices, to ship off thousands and tens of thousands to the 
markets of Louisiana, Alabama, and Mississippi. But these 
markets are already glutted, and hiunan flesh has fallen in value 
from 50 to 75 per cent. Nor is it probable that the great staple 
of Virginia and Maryland will hereafter aftbrd a bounty on its 
production. In these States slave labor is unprofitable, and the 
bondman is of but little value, save as an article of exportation. 
The cotton cultivation in the East Indies, by cheapening the arti- 
cle, will close the markets in the South, and thus it guarantees 
the abolition of slavery in the breeding States. When it shall be 
found no longer pi-ofitable to raise slaves for the market, the 
stock on hand will be driven South and sold for what it may 
fetch, and free labor substituted in its place. This process will 
be attended with results disastrous to the cotton States. To 
Virginia and Maryland, it will open a neAv era of industry, pros- 
perity and wealth ; and the industrious poor, the " mean whites" 
of the South, will remove within their borders, thus leaving the 
slaveholders more defenceless than ever. But while the white 
population of the South will be thus diminished, its number of 
slaves will be increased by the addition of the stock from the 
breeding States. 

And what, fellow-citizens, will be the condition of such of you 
as shall then remain in the slave States ? The change to which we 
have referred will necessarily aggravate every present evil. Igno- 
rance, vice, idleness, lawless violence, dread of insurrection, anarchy, 
and a haughty and vindictive aristocracy will all combine with 
augmented energy in crushing you to the earth. And from what 
quarter do you look for redemption ? Think you your planting 
nobility will ever grant freedom to their serfs, from sentiments of 
piety or patriotism ? Remember that your clergy of all sects and 
ranks, many of them " Christian brokers in the trade of blood," 
unite in bestowing their benediction on the system as a Christian 
institution, and in teaching the slaveholders that they wield the 
whip as European monarchs the sceptre, " by the grace of God." 
Do you trust to their patriotism ? Remember that the beautiful 



54 

and affecting contrast between the prospeiity of tlie North and 
the desolation of tlie South, ah-eady prei^cnted to you, was drawn 
by W. C. Preston, of hanging notoriety. No, fellow-citizens, 
your great slaveholders have no idea of surrendering the personal 
importance and the political influence they derive from their 
slaves. Your Calhouns, Footes, and Prestons, all go for ever- 
lasting slavery. 

Unquestionably there are many of the smaller slaveholders who 
would embrace abolition sentiments, were they permitted to ex- 
amine the subject ; but at present they are kept in ignorance. 
If then the fetters of the slave are not to be broken by the 
master, by whom is he to be liberated ? In the course of time, a 
hostile army, invited by the weakness or 'the arrogance of the 
South, may land on your shores. Then, indeed, emancipation wuU 
be given, but the gift may be bathed in the blood of yourselves 
and of your children. Or the People — for they will be the Peo- 
ple — may resolve to be free, and you and all you hold dear may 
be sacrificed in the contest. 

Suffer lis, fellow-citizens, to show you " a more excellent way." 
We seek the welfare of all, the rich and the poor, the bond and 
the free. While we repudiate all acknowledgment of property 
in human beings, we rejoice in the honest, lawful prosperity of 
the planter. Let not, we beseech you, the freedom of the slave 
proceed from the armed invader of your soil, nor from his oAvn 
torch and dagger — but from your peaceful and constitutional 
interference in his behalf. 

In breaking the chains v.'hich bind the slave, be assured you 
will be delivering yourselves from a grievous thraldom. Ponder 
well, we implore you, the following suggestions. 

Without your co-operation, the slaveholders, much as they 
despise you, are powerless. To you they look for agents, and 
stewards, for overseers, and drivers, and patrols. To you they 
look for votes to elevate them to office, and to you they too often 
look for aid to enforce their Lynch laws. Feel then your own 
power ; claim your rights, and exert them for the deliverance of 
the sla'te, and consequently for your own happiness and pros- 
perity. 

Let then your first demand be for liberty of speech. Your 
Constitution and laAvs guarantee to j'ou this right in the most 
solemn and explicit terms ; and yet you have permitted a few 
slaveholders to rob you of it. Resume it at once. Be not afraid 
to speak openly of your wrongs, and of the true cause of them. 
Dread not the Lynch clubs. Their power depends Avholly on 
opinion. The slaveholders are not strong enough to execute their 



56 

own sentences, if you resist them. They shrank, in Charleston, 
from prohibiting the sale of Dickens' Notes, because they believed 
the people were determined to read them. Had the same curi- 
osity been felt in Petersburg, to read the article on Bible Slavery 
in Breckenridge's Magazine, the slaveholders there would not 
have dared to purloin them from the post-office and bum them 
in the street. In the one place they strained at a gnat, in the 
other they swallowed a camel. Be assured, your bulHes are 
timid bullies ; not that they are wanting in individual courage, 
but because they are aware that their authority rests, not 
on their physical strength, but on your habits of deference and 
obedience. Speak then boldly, and without disguise ; and 
be assured that no sooner will your tongues be loosed on the for- 
bidden subject, than you will be surprised to find what a coinci- 
dence of thought exists in relation to it. Discussion once com- 
menced, the enemies of slavery will multiply faster with you 
than they do elsewhere for the obvious reason, that with you 
there is no dispute about facts. You all know and daily witness 
the blighting influence of the curse which overspreads your land ; 
and believe us, that just in proportion as your courage rises, will 
the arrogance of your oppressors sink. 

By conversing freely among j'ourselves, and proclaiming your 
hostility to slavery in public meetings, you will create an influence 
that will soon reach the Press. The bands with which the slave- 
holders have bound this Leviathan will then be snapped asunder. 
Once establish a free press, and the fate of slavery is sealed. 
Such a press will advocate your rights, will encourage education 
and industry, will point out the true cause of the depravation of 
morals, tlie prevalence of violence, and the depression of the 
public welfare. 

Having gained the liberty of speech and of the press, you 
will go on, conquering and to conquer. Political action on your 
part will lead to new triumphs. The State legislatures and the 
public offices will no longer be the exclusive patrimony of the 
holders of slaves. Having once obtained a footing in your legis- 
lative halls, you Avill have secured in a quiet, peaceable, constitu- 
tional mode, the downfall of slavery, th$ recovery of your rights, 
and the prosperit}' and happiness of' your country. 

Think us not extravagantly sanguine. The very horror mani- 
fested by the slaveholders of the means Ave^recomend, is evidence 
of their efficacy. We advise you to exercise freedom of speech. 
Have they not endeavored to bully you into silence by the threat, 
that " the question of slaveiy is not and shall not be open to 
discussion;" and that the moment any private individual talks 



LofC. 



56 

about the means of terminating slavery, " that moment his tongue 
shall be ait out and cast ujwn a dunghill f^ 

Promote a free press. Is not the wisdom of the recommenda- 
tion verified by the proclamation made of " instant death" to the 
abolition editors in the slave States, if " they avow their ojnn- 
ions ?" 

Your Constitutions have indeed been rendered by the slave- 
holders " blurred and obliterated parchments ;" be it your care 
to restore them to their pristine beauty, and to make them fair 
and legible charters of the rights of man. 

But we doubt not, fellow-citizens, that although you give your 
cordial assent to all we have said respecting the practical influ- 
ence of slavery, you have, nevertheless, some misgivings about 
the effect of immediate emancipation. Shut up as you are in 
darkness on this subject, threatened with death if you talk or' 
write about it ; while the utmost pains are taken to prevent books 
or papers, whicli might enlighten you, from falling into your 
hands, it would be wonderful indeed, were you at once prepared 
to admit the safety and policy of instant and unconditional eman- 
cipation. You are assured, and probably believe, that massacre, 
and contlagiation, and xmiversal ruin would ensue on " letting 
loose the negroes ;" but you are kept in ignorance of the fact, 
that in various parts of the world, negroes have been let loose, 
and in no one instance have such consequences followed ; and you 
are not permitted to learn, in discussion, the reasons why such 
consequences never have followed, and never will follow the im- 
mediate abolition of slavery. What think you would be the fate 
of the man who should attempt to deli\^er a lecture in Charleston 
or Mobile on the safety of emancipation? Yet such a lecture 
might be delivered with perfect safety, were the lecturer to be 
accompanied by one or two hundred of your number, declaring 
their determination to maintain freedom of speech and to protect 
the lecturer. From such a lecture you would learn, with astonish- 
ment, that the atrocities in St. Domingo, so constantly used by 
the slaveholders to intimidate the refractory, arose from a civil 
war, Avhich the planters, by their own folly and wickedness, kin- 
dled between themselves and the free blacks, and were AvhoUy 
independent of the subsequent act of the French Government 
manumitting the slaves. You would also hear, perhaps for the 
first time, of the peaceful abolition of slavery in Mexico and South 
America. You would listen, Avith a surprise almost bordciing on 
incredulity, to accounts of the glorious, wonderful success, attend- 
ing the emancipation of 800,000 slaves in the British Colonies, 
without the loss of a single life. You would learn that in these 



61 

colonies, among the liberated slaves, ten, twenty, thirty times as 
numerous as the whites, a degree of tranquility and good order 
and security is enjoyed, utteily imknown in any Southern or 
Western slave State. The complaints (grossly exaggerated, if 
they reach you through the medium of a pro-slavery press) of 
the want of labor and the diminution of production, arise not 
from the idleness, but the indusiry of the enfranchised slaves. 
Their wives and children, no longer toiling under the lash, are 
noAV engaged in tlie occupations of the family and of the school ; 
while many of the fathers and husbands have become landholders, 
and raise their own food, and also articles for the market. Sub- 
stantial and honest prosperity is gradually taking the place of 
that wealth, which, as in all other slave countries, was concen- 
trated in the hands of a few, and was extorted from the labor of 
a wretched, degraded and dangerous population. 

If you admit the greatest happiness of tlie greatest number to 
be the true test of national prosperity, then, beyond all contro- 
versy, the British West Indies are now infinitely more prosperous 
than at any previous period of their history. 

Despots and aristocrats have, in all ages, been afraid of " turning 
loose" the people, no matter of what hue was their complexion. 
You have seen that your own McDuffie does not scruple to inti- 
mate, that, were not tlie Southern laborers already shackled, an 
order of nobility would be required to keep them in subjection ; 
and a shudder seizes Chancellor Harper, when he reflects that 
the Northern allies of the slaveholders are democrats and 
agrarians. 

A glorious career opens before you. In the place of your pre- 
sent contempt, and degradation, and misery, honor, and wealth, 
and happiness court your acceptance. By abolishing slavery 
you will become the architects of yom- own fortune, and of your 
country's greatness. The times are propitious for the great 
achievement. You will be cheered by the approbation of your 
own consciences, and by the plaudits of mankind. The institu- 
tion which oppresses you is suffering from the decrepitude of 
age, and is the scorn and loathing of the world. Out of the 
slave region, patriots and philanthropists, and Christians of every 
name and sect abhor and execrate it. Do you pant for liberty 
and equality, more substantial than such as is now found only ia 
your obliterated and tattered bills of right ? Do you ask that your 
children may be rescued from the ignorance and irreligion to 
which they are now doomed, and that avenues may be opened 
for you and for them to honest and profitable employment ? Unite 
then, we beseech you, with one heart and one mind, for the legal, 



68 

constitutional abolition of slavery. The enemy is waxing faint 
and losing his courage. He is terrified by the echo of his own 
threats, and the very proposal to dissolve the Union and leave 
him to his fate, throws him into paroxysms. The North, so long 
submissive to his mandates, and awed by his insolence, laughs at 
his impotent rage ; and all his hopes now rest upon a few profli- 
gate politicians whom he purchases with his votes, while their 
baseness excites his contempt, and their principles his fears. Now 
is the time, fellow-citizens, to assail the foe. Up — quit yourselves 
like men : and may Almighty God direct and bless your efforts ! 



SHALL WE GIVE BIBLES TO THREE MILLIONS 
OF AMERICAN SLAVES ? 

It is more tlian thirty years since the American Bible 
Society was formed, for the purpose of supplying the whole 
people of the United States with the Holy Scriptures. Yet 
the great body of slaves, amounting to one-sixth of our popula- 
tion, are still unsupplied. And no systematic effort has 
ever been made to supply them. Is it not high time that 
an effort should be made to unite, for this purpose, the coun- 
sels and the charities of all who love the Bible, however 
diversified may be their views on other subjects r 

It is believed that the present is a favorable time for such an 
effort. The welfare of our churches, the. increasing interest 
which is felt for the condition of the slaves, the state of public 
opinion, call for the proposal of this method of action in favor 
of the slaves. All religious men should cordially unite in this 
noble purpose, for it is clearly right and practicable, and 
purely benevolent and salutary to all parties, and it may lead 
all those who engage in it to cooperate in other well devised 
plans for the good of the oppressed. 

If heartily undertaken, and earnestly pursued, in conjunc- 
tion with other obvious duties with reference to the slaves, 
will it not restore to our churches those feelings of brotherly 
love, confidence and cooperation, which never fail to be fol- 
lowed by the outpouring of God's Spirit, and the extensive 
revival of true religion .'' 

The following considerations seem worthy of general atteu-, 
tion : — 

I. — It is a sin to loithhold the Bible from nn./. 
Says the Rev. Albert Barnes, in his late work on slavery : 
" The withholding of instruction is forbidden in the New 
Testament. Nothing is more definite in the Bible, or more in 
accordance with all our views of what is proper and right, 
than the declarations that all men have a clear right to know 
the truth ; to receive instruction ; to have free access to the ora- 
cles of God. Luke xi. 52 : ' Woe unto you, lawyers! for ye 
have taken away the key of knowledge ; ye entered not in 
yourselves, and them that were entering in, ye hindered.' 
John V. 39 : '^Search the Scriptures, for in them ye think ye 
have eternal life, and they are they which testify of me.' 
Prov. xix. 2 : ' That the soul be without knowledge, it is not 
good.' " p. 361. 



The Rev. E. N. Kirk, in a letter recently published, dated 
Boston, February 20, 1847, says : " No man, or body of men, 
has a right to prevent any human being from learning to read, 
and from reading the Word of God. And every human being 
has a commission from God to do all that is in his power to 
communicate that Word to every other human being. The 
fact that there are laws against it, whether in ancient Rome, 
or in modern Rome, in Mecca or in Charleston, in no way af- 
fects our duty ; and he that hinders us in this good work, must 
answer to Christ for it." 

The Bible Society of Charleston, S. C, in their thirty- 
fourth report, claim the circulation of the Bible as a common 
cause : " Regarding the work of Bible distribution as a great 
common cause, — unlimited by metes and bouuds, an embodiment 
of efforts and means for furnishing to all mankind the counsels 
of the MoE-t High, — and thus to lay the only sure foundation 
of all other Christian effort, whether personal or social ; it is 
really both a privilege and a duty to be participants in the en- 
terprise." 

II. — The Bible is generally and intentionally icithheld from 
the Slaves. 

1. The Rev. C. C. Jones, Presbyterian, in a sermon preach- 
ed before the planters of Liberty county, Georgia, and pub- 
lished by them, in 1831, says, " We cannot cry out against 
the papists for withholding the Scriptures from the common 
people, for we withhold the Bible from our servants." In an 
essay, he says, " The statutes of our respective States forbid 
it, or when through oversight they do not, custom does. He 
cannot search the Scriptures, for a knowledge of letters he has 
not, and cannot legally obtain." 

2. The Rev. .1. S. Law, Baptist, in an essay prepared at the 
request of the Georgia Baptist Association, in 1846, says of 
the slaves : — " They have no access to the Word of God. We 
have taken under our own keeping the key of knowledge. 
Thoy cannot read the Word of God ; we are the cause of this 
inability. We permit them not to take into their owu hands 
the lamp of life." 

3. The Synod of South Carolina and Georgia, say in 1833, 
" In this Christian Republic there are over two millions of 
human beings in the condition of heathen ; they have no 
Bibles." 

4. The Synod of Kentucky say, that " access to the Scrip- 
tures '' is not, " to any extent worth naming, enjoyed by 
slaves. The law, as it exists here, does not prevent free access 



to the slaves, but ignorance, the natural result of their condi- 
tion, does. The Bible is before them, but it is to them a seal- 
ed book." 

5. The presbytery of New Orleans, say, that " of 100,000 
of this class of people within our bounds, it may be safely as- 
serted that 75,000 never hear the doctrine of salvation 
preached." 

5. The presbytery of Alabama say, " The Bible, the pre- 
cious fountain of life, is a sealed book to the black." 

7. The Rev. G. W. Freeman, now Bishop of Texas, says, 
in a published sermon, that slave children ought to be baptised 
and taught orally the Lord's prayer, creed and commandments, 
but " it is not necessary they should be taught to read." 

8. The Rev. Mr. Converse, of Vermont, formerly of Vir- 
ginia, says in a sermon, that " those called field-hands live 
and die without being told by their pious masters that Jesus 
Christ died to save sinners." 

111. — Ecerijhodij ought to have the Bible. 

1. The Mississippi Conference of the M. E. Church, in 
1843, passed a resolve, that " the circulation of the Bible 
without note or comment, is, in all conceivable circumstances, 
indispensable to anything like eminent success in missionary 
effort." 

2. The General Conference of the M. E. Church, South, in 
■ 1846, pledged its concurrence in the efforts of the American 

Bible Society, to place a copy of the Holy Bible in the hands 
of every man, woman and child in our own country." 

3. The American Bible Society, at its anniversary in 1846, 
resolved, that " the Bible is for man a necessary of life." 

4. The venerable Dr. Alexander has said, that " religious 
emotions and influences work upward ; they begin with ser- 
vants, children, and females, and thus reach those who are 
more difficult of access." This shows by what means we are 
to evangelize Southern society. 

5. The Hon. Theodore Frelinghuysen, in his oration at 
New Brunswick, 1831, says, of the Bible, "It is a munition 
of rocks for all our social and civil privileges. Let its influ- 
ence go forth and spread through the land, in its purity and 
power, and all outrage and crime, oppression and tyranny would 
retire before it." — p. 9. 

IV. — The work ought to he done by the American Bible 

Society. 
1. The Mississippi Conference, 1843, expressly declared 
their " entire confidence in the integrity and catholic character 



of the American Bible Society," and promised to " heartily 
countenance and cooperate with any accredited agent " of 
that Society, 

2. At a meeting in New York, in 1835, Mr. Birney 
strongly advocated the measure, as calculated to do great good, 
especiall}' in regard to the States of Kentucky and Tennessee, 
where no legal restrictions exist against the distribution of the 
Scriptures. If the work could be done in these States, other 
States would follow the example. And who should do this 
work, or attempt it, but the American Bible Society ? 

3. The Board of Managers of the American Bible Society, in 
1834, declare in express reference to the slaves, their object to be 
" the circulation of the Holy Scriptures without note or com- 
ment among their destitute fellow men of every name and nation 
wherever they can be reached," and that they " will thankfully 
receive the contributions of all societies and individuals who 
may be disposed to cooperate with them in their benevolent 
undertaking." In 1835, they say they have " made on re- 
quest, several small grants of the Scriptures for the benefit of 
colored people." In their report for 1845, they intimate " the 
readiness of the Board to cooperate, to the extent of their 
ability, in furnishing all who can read with the Book of Life, 
of every condition and color." 

4. In their report for 1845, they detail their grantsfor prisons, 
and to seamen and boatmen, but specify none for slaves. In 1844, 
they mention gifts for the army and navy, for prisons, to In-* 
dians, soldiers, seamen, but not slaves. In 1846, they mention, 

rpp. 5 and 9, specific grants of Bibles for prisons, Sunday schools, 
Swedes, seamen, ships of war, canals and lakes, Indians, and 
sundry others, but none for slaves. The reports of 1845 and 
1846, contain acknowledgments of donations, in money, receiv- 
ed expressly for the slaves, as well as for many other specific 
objects. 

Obj. 1. — That the latvs are against it. 

1. There is no law known against giving the Bible to the 
slaves, in at least six of the states, Delaware, Maryland, Vir- 
ginia, Kentucky, Tennessee and Missouri ; and no law in 
these states against teaching them to read. In Virginia, there 
is a law against collecting slaves in schools, but none against 
the instruction of individuals at home. Let us give the Bible 
to the slaves in those States, where there is no law against it, 
before we resort to the law as an apology for our neglect. 

2. The Rev. Dr. Fuller, late of Beaufort, S. C, has pub- 
lished that these wicked laws " aro most of them virtually 



repealed by universal practice." He says of one of them, 
" Violate it most industriously." And in regard to the slaves' 
reading, " Howmanyare taught." The laws, then, constitute 
no part of the difficulty in the way. Such wicked laws, in this 
country, must be dead as soon as they begin to be openly dis- 
regarded. 

3. A correspondent of the Journal of Commerce at Savan- 
nah, July 7, 1845, says, " There is a law of the State prohibit- 
inof the instruction of slaves in writing and reading, and yet 
there is scarcely a family in which they are not thus instructed, 
or permitted to be instructed. I have resided in this commu- 
nity for thirty years, and have never heard of a prosecution 
for a violation of this law, although it was well known to the 
police of the city that public schools have been kept by colored 
persons for the instruction of that class. Why is this } for no 
other reason than that public sentiment was opposed to the 
law." 

Obj. 2. — The slaves cannot read the Bible. 

Ans. 1. The Rev. D. Butler, at the 30th anniversary of the 
American Bible Society, said, " The books left there [among 
the destitute] may lie neglected for years, but they will one 
day make their influence felt. We have no right to say that 
the Bible, in anj^ case whatever, does no good." 

2. We never hear that objection alleged when any other 
class of persons are spoken of. The rule has always been to 
give to all who will receive and not abuse it. 

3. Many can read. Some masters, and more mistresses, 
teach their house servants. Many slaves learn from the chil- 
dren of the family. They often keep their ability to read a 
secret from their masters. 

4. In the 29th report of the American Bible Society, p. 51, 
is an extract of a communication from a female auxiliary rioci- 
ety in Abingdon, Virginia, as follows : 

" Several instances are given of Sabbath schools having 
been established in illiterate neighborhoods, through the 
instrumentality of Bibles given to the poor and ignorant. A 
father and mother, with their eight children, were induced to 
attend a Sabbath school in order to learn to read., by presents of 
Bibles. Many copies of Testaments and Psalms have been 
given to servants [slaves] , and they have uniformly had the 
desired influence of inducing them to learn to reac?.'' 

5. Giving the Bible is the best inducement to learn to read, 
and the best help for adults to learn. If you wish your son to 
learn to swim, you send him into the water. 



6 

6. Giving the Bible will open the way for all the other 
means, and will be followed by teachers, preachers, and Sab- 
bath Schools. 

7. The following narrative, from the American Messenger, 
published by the Tract Society, shows that colporteurs are la- 
boriously spending days and days in circulating books at the 
South among tchite people who cannot read — and with happy 
effects. 

" Mental Aliment. — On the James River lives an elderly 
woman in indigent circumstances, and with few opportunities 
for religious instruction. Her brother, who is a blacksmith, 
resides some two miles distant, with no intervening road except 
it be a bridle path through the woods. He was visited by a 
colporteur of the American Tract Society, and induced to pur- 
chase Baxter's Saint's Rest, although he could not read a line. 
As soon as his day's work was done, he hied across the fields to 
inform his sister of the new treasure, and to secure her aid in 
unfolding it. She could read a little by spelling the words 
containing more than one syllable. Soon after sundown, they 
had gathered the few neighbors, as ignorant as themselves, and 
she began her task. It was twelve o'clock before the black- 
smith returned to his home — and in all that time they had, by 
dint of effort, read about half a chapter ! When he saw the 
colporteur the next day, he was full of his praises of the book, 
and requested him to go to his sister's, who wanted another. 
When the colporteur made his way to her door, and explained 
the object of his visit, she thanked him cordially, and spoke 
of the profit derived from the few pages she had read. " Why," 
said she, " I have felt ever since, as if my mind had eaten some- 
thing.^'' 

8. While we are doing so much to relieve the people of a 
distant nation, who are suffering a famine of bread, wh}' shall 
we not hasten to relieve the millions of our own countrj-men, 
who endm-e, from the cradle to the grave, the far more terrible 
calamity, the hunger of the soul, or famine of the Word of 
God ! 

V. — Thcicis a strong feeling at the South, ichich may be relied 
on for efficient cooperation. 
1. The Rev. John C. Young, D.D., president of the Col- 
lege at Danville, Ky., preached a sermon in the Presbyterian 
church, which was published by the members of the church, 
in 1846, in which he urges the duty of masters to their slaves, 
in " teaching and encom-ao;in2 them to read God's Word." 
He denies that we have any right, " for the sake of perpetuat- 



ing a system which we imagine to be gainful, to keep a 
whole race of our fellow men in such a state of degradation as 
to debar them from all direct access to God's Word, and thus 
fearfully multiply the chances of their eternal perdition. 

" No iniquitous or Heaven-insulting laws have ever been 
passed among us, making it penal to teach any of God's crea- 
tures to read the messages which he himself has sent to them 
We have not so far imitated the Pope of Rome, as to make the 
Bible a sealed book to those under our authority. Were a 
law of this kind in existence, we should feel bound to regard 
it just as far as we would a law forbidding us to feed the hun- 
gry, or clothe the naked. 

" What pious or philanthropic heart could countenance, even 
for a moment, the existence of a system, whose existence de- 
pended on excluding its subjects for ever from obeying the 
divine command to ' search the Scriptures,' in which alone we 
' have eternal life.' 

" Can you think (I appeal to the conscience of every Chris- 
tian), that you are giving to your servants what is 'just and 
equal,' while you are taking no measures to enable them to share 
in a privilege of such priceless value .^" 

Surely, a ehvirch which publishes such sentiments, will be 
ready to cooperate, by giving the Bible to the slaves in its 
own neighborhood. And when once the work is begun, sys- 
tematically and in earnest, it must go on until it is complete. 
There is then no line at which it can be stopped. 

VI. — The icork is already begun. 
While the general testimony proves that the great body of 
slaves are intentionally kept from the Bible, and from the abil- 
ity to read it, the fact that some are supplied shows that no- 
thing but a united effort is needed to extend the blessing to 
all. 

1 . At a meeting of the American Bible Society at Cincinnati 
in 1843, a gentleman, whose name is not given in the published 
reports, said " he had often done it without opposition or moles- 
tation," and if his northern friends would " raise funds for the 
specific purpose of distributing Bibles among the colored peo- 
ple," he would " pledge himself to take charge of such funds, 
and faithfully appropriate every dollar." 

2. The editor of the Philadelphia Observer, who formerly 
resided in Virginia, says, Nov. 2Q^ 1846, " The door is thrown 
wide open for preaching the gospel to the slaves. In some 
portions of the Southern country, they are taught by their 
masters to read the Bible." 



8 

3 A gentleman writes from Louisville, to the New York 
Observer, Feb., 1847, that he found in that city, " seven Sab- 
bath schools in successful operation among the colored popula- 
tion," and " God has blessed their efforts with encouraging 
success; multitudes have learned to read the Word of God." 
It is understood that similar efforts are followed with similar 
results, in St. Louis. What is wanting but a concerted effort, 
with the blessing of God, to extend this supply, from these 
two starting jjoints, all over the land. 

Vn. — What ice should all do to promote it. 

1. Let us take it for granted that all who believe and love 
the Bible, are ready to co-operate in this work, as far as they 
have the ability, whenever its claims are fairly understood. 

2. Let us act, in all respects, as if we believed it to be a 
work that God requires and that is surely to be done. 

3. Let us freely and fully express our sentiments, and the 
interest we feel in the matter, with Christian meekness and 
fidelity, in all those ways, at those times, and through those 
channels, which are ordinarily found fitted to arouse public 
attention, to correct public opinion, and to produce general 
and united action. 

4. Let us without delay give our money to the American 
Bible Society, as an earnest of our sincerity — as evidence that 
we believe the thing is going to be done, and that we have con- 
fidence in our brethren, and as a pledge of our readiness to sup- 
port the effort to any extent it may require. 

No other measure will have half the eflicacy of this, in giv- 
ing to the movement the desired weight, stability, and power, 
both to call out the liberality of the North, and to open the 
way and secure the requisite co-operation at the South. 

Just imagine the effect that would be produced by sending 
donations to the Society from ten thousand churches, of differ- 
ent names, for this specific purpose! " The Slave's Bible 
Fund" will not long lie idle ; and it will be all needed, and 
much more, in supplying the three millions of American slaves 
with the Bible. 

Published by the American and Foreign Anti-Slavery Society. 

WILLIAM IIARNED, PUBLISHING AGENT, 
Being No. 1 of a series of Tracts recommended to the friends of God and ruon, foi 
eenertil circulation ihrougliout the land. Price, one mill per page. 



15 

whip him ; for, if he let him pass, he must another, &c. He 
stated that he had sometimes caught and flogged four in a 
night. 

In conversation with Mr. Swan about runaway slaves, he 
stated to me the following fact : — A slave by the name of 
Luke, was owned in Wilmington ; he was sold to a specu- 
lator and carried to Georgia. After an absence of about 
two months the slave returned : he watched an opportunity 
to enter his old master's house when the family were absent, 
no one beino: at home but a Yountr waitincr man. Luke went 
to the room where his master kept his arms ; took his gun, 
with some ammunition, and went into the woods. On the 
return of his master, the waiting man told him what had been 
done; this threw him into a violent passion ; he swore he 
would kill Luke, or lose his own life. He loaded another 
gun, took two men, and made search, but could not find him; 
he then advertised him, ofterinsf a larsre reward if delivered 
to him or lodged in jail. His neighbors, however, advised 
him to offer a reward oftwo hundred dollars for him dead or 
alive, which he did. Nothing however was h#ard of him for 
6ome months. Mr. Swan said, one of his slaves had ran 
away, and was gone eight or ten weeks ; on his return he 
said he had found Luke, and that he had a lifle, two pistols, 
and a swoi'd. 

I left the plantation in the spring, and returned to the 
North; when I went out again, the next fall, I asked Sir. 
Swan if anything had been heard of Luke ; he said he was 
shot, and related to me the manner of his death, as follows : 
— Luke went to one of the plantations, and entered a hut for 
something to eat. Being fatigued, he sat down and fell asleep. 
There was only a woman in the hut at the time : as soon as 
she found he was asleep, she ran and told her master, who 
took his rifle, and called two white men on another planta- 
tion ; the three, with their rifles, then went to the hut, and 
posted themselves at different positions, so that^ they could 
watch the door. When Luke waked up he went to the door 
to look out, and saw them with their rifles, he stepped back 
and raised his gun to his face. They called to him to sur- 
render ; and stated that they had him in their jaower, and 
said he had better give up. He said he would not ; and if 
they tried to take him he would kill one of them ; for if he 
gave up, he knew they would kill him, and he was deter- 



16 

mined to sell his life as dear as he could. They told him if 
he should shoot one of them, the other two would certainly 
kill him : he replied, he was determined not to give up. and 
kept his gun moving from one to the other ; and while his rifle 
was turned toward one, another, standing in a different di- 
rection, shot him through the head, and he fell lifeless to the 
ground. 

There was another slav^ shot while I was there ; this man 
had I'un away, and had been living in the woods a longtime, 
and it was not known where he was, till one day he was dis- 
covered by two men, who went on the large island near Bel- 
videre to hunt turkeys : they shot him and carried his head 
home. 

It is common to keep dogs on the plantations, to pursue 
and catch runaway slaves. I was once bitten by one of 
them. I went to the overseer's house, the dog lay in the 
piazza : as soon as I put my foot upon the floor, he sprang 
and bit me just above the knee, but not severely ; he tore my 
pantaloons badly. The overseer apologized for his dog, say- 
ing he never knew him to bite a 7olnte man before. He said 
he once had a flog, when he lived on another plantation, that 
was very useful to him in hunting runaway negroes. He said 
that a slave on the plantation once ran away ; as soon as 
he found the course h§ took, he put the dog on the track, and 
he soon came so close upon him that the aiian had to climb 
a tree ; he followed with his gun, and biought the slave home. 

The slaves have a great dread of being sold and carried 
South. It is generally said, and I have no doubt of its truth, 
that they are much worse treated faither South. 

The following are a few among the many facts related to 
me while I lived among the slaveholders. The names of the 
planters and plantations, I shall not give, as they did not come 
nnder my own ohserration. I however place the fullest con- 
fidence in their truth. 

A planter not far from Mr. Swan's, employed an overseer 
to whom he paid -$'100 a year ; he became dissatisfied with 
him, because he did not drive the slaves hard enouo;!), and 
get more work out of them. He therefoie sent to Soutfi 
Carolina, or Georgia, and got a man to whom he paid I be- 
lieve $800 a year. He pioved to be a cruel fellow, and drove 
the slaves almost to death. There was a slave on this plan- 
tation, who had repeatedly run away, and had been severely 



■17 

flogged every time. The last time he waa caught, a hole 
was dug in the ground, and he buried up to the chin, his 
arms being secured down by his sides. He was kept in this 
Situation four or five days. 

The following was told me by an intimate friend ; it took 
place on a plantation containing about one hundred slaves. 
One day the owner ordered the women into the barn ; he 
then went in among them, whip in hand, and told them he 
meant to flog them all to death ; they began immediately to 
cry out " What have I done MassaV " What have I done 
Massa ]" He replied ; " D — n you I will let you know 
what you have done; you don't breed, I haven't had a young 
one from one of you for several months." They told him 
they could not breed while they had to work in the rice 
ditches. (The rice grounds aie low and marshy, and have 
to be drained, and while ditrging or dealing the ditches, the 
women had to work in mud and water fiom one to two feet 
in depth ; they were obliged to draw up and secure their 
frocks about their waist, to keep tliem out of the water : in 
this manner they frequently had to work from daylight in 
the morning till it was so dark they could see no longei.) — 
After swearing and threatening for some time, he told ihem 
to tell the overseer's wife when they got in that way, and he 
would put them upon the l;ind to vvoi'l\;. 

This same planter had a female slave who was a member 
of the Methodist Church ; for a slave she was intelligent 
and conscientious. He proposed a criminal intercourse with 
her. She would not comply. He left her and sent for the 
overseer, and told him to have her flogged. It was done. — 
Not long after, he renewed his proposal. She again refused. 
She was again whipped. He then told her why she had 
been twice flogged, and told her he intended to whip her 
until she should yield. The girl, seeing that her case was 
hopeless, her back smarting with the scourging she had re- 
ceived, and dreading a repetition, gave herself up to be the 
victim of his brutal lusts. 

One of the slaves on another plantation cave birth to a 
child which lived but two or three weeks. After its death 
the planter called the woman to him, and asked her how she 
came to let the child die; said it was all owing to her care- 
lessness, and that he meant to flog her for it. She told him 
with all the feeling of a mother, the circumstances of its death. 



18 

Rut her story availed her nothing against the savage brutality 
of her master. She was severely whipped. A healthy child 
four months old was then considered worth $100 in North 
Carolina. 

The foregoing facts were related to me by white persons 
of character and respectability. The following fact was re- 
lated to me on a plantation where I have spent considerable 
time, and where the punishment was inflicted. I have no 
doubt of its truth. A slave ran away from his master, and 
got as far as Newbern. He took provisions that lasted him 
a week ; but having eaten all, he Avent to a house to get 
something to satisfy his hunger. A white man suspecting 
him to be a runaway, demanded his pass : as he had none he 
was seized and put in Newbern jail. He was there adver- 
tised, his description given, &c. His master saw the adver- 
tisement and sent for him ; when he was brought back, his 
wrists were tied together and drawn over his knees. A stick 
Was then passed over his arms and under his knees, and he 
secured in this manner, his trowsers were then stripped down, 
and he turned over on his side, and severely beaten with the 
paddle, and then turned over and severely beaten on the 
other side, and then turned back again, and tortured by an- 
other bruising and beating. He was afterwards kept in the 
stocks a week, and whipped every morning. 

To show the disgusting pollutions of slavery, and how it 
covei's with moral filth every thing it touches, I will state two 
or three facts, which I have on such evidence I cannot doubt 
their truth. A planter offered a white man of my acquaint- 
ance twenty dollars for every one of his female slaves he 
would get in the family way. This offer was no doubt made 
for the purpose of improving the stock, on the same ])rinci- 
ple that farmers endeavor to improve their cattle by crossing 
the breed. 

Slaves belonging to merchants and others in the city, often 
hire their own time,for which they pay various prices per week 
or month, according to the capacity of the slave. The females 
who thus hire their time, pursue various modes to procure 
the money ; their masters make no cnrpiiry how they get it, 
provided the money comes. If it is not regularly paid they 
are flosofed. Some take in washine, some cook on board 
vessels, pick oakum, sell peanuts, &c., while others, youi'ger 
and more comely, often resort to the vilest pursuits. I 



19 

knew a man from the North, who, though married to a res- 
pectable southern woman, kept two of these mulatto girls in 
an upper room of his store ; his wife told some of her friends 
that he had not lodged at home for two weeks together. I 
have seen these two ke2)t misses, as they are called, at his 
store ; he was afterwards stabbed in an attempt to arrest a 
runaway slave, and died in about ten days. 

The clergy at the North cringe beneath the corrupting in- 
fluence of slavery, and their moral courage is borne down 
by it. Not the hypocritical and unprincipled alone, but even 
such as can hardly be supposed to be destitute of sincerity. 

Going one morning to the Baptist Sunday School in Wil- 
mington, in which I was engaged, I fell in with the Rev. 
Thomas P. Hunt, who was going to the Presbyterian school. 
I asked him how he could bear to see the little negro chil- 
dren beating their hoops, hallooing, and running about the 
streets, as we then saw them, their moral condition entirely 
neglected, while the whites were so carefully gathered into 
the schools. His reply was substantially this : — ' I can't bear 
it, Mr. Caulkiiis. I feel as deeply as any one can on this 
subject, but what can I do ] Mv hands are tied." 

Now, if Mr. Hunt was guilty of neglecting his duty, as a 
servant of Him who never failed to rebuke sin in high 
places, what shall be said of those clergymen at the North, 
(where the power that closed his mouth is comparatively un- 
felt,) whorefuse to tell their people howGod abhors oppres- 
sion, and who seldom open their mouths on this subject, 
but to denounce the friends of emancipation, thus giving the 
strongest sjipport to the accursed system of slavery. I be- 
lieve Mr. Hunt has since become an agent of the Tempe- 
rance Society. 

In staling the foregoing facts, my object has been to show 
the practical workings of the system of slavery, and if possi- 
ble to correct the misapprehension on this subject, so com- 
mon at the Nbrtli. In doing this I am not at war with slave- 
holders. No, my soul is moved for them as well as for the 
poor slaves. May God send them repentance, to the ac- 
knowledgement of the truth ! Principle, on a subject of 
this nature, is dearer to me than the applause of men, and 
should not be sacrificed on any subject, even tliough the ties 
of friendship may be broken. We have too long been silent 
on this subject; the slave has been too much considered, by 



20 

our Northern states, as being kept by necessity in bis pres- 
ent condition. Were we to ask, in the hmguage of Pihite, 
What evil have they donel — we may search their history, we 
cannot find that they have taken up arms against our gov- 
ernment, nor insuked us a nation, that they are thus com- 
pelled to drag out a life in chains — subjected to the most 
terrible inflictions if in any way they manifest a wish to be 
released. Let us reverse the question. What evil has been 
done to them by those who call themselves masters '( First 
let us look at their persons, "neither clothed nor naked"— 
I have seen instances where this phrase would not apply to 
boys and girls, and that too in winter. I knew one young 
man seventeen years of age, by the name of Dave, on Mr. 
J. Swan's plantation, worked day after day at the rice ma- 
chine, as naked as when he was born. The reason of his be- 
ing so, his master said in my hearing, was that he could not 
keep clothes on him — he would get iuto the fire and burn 
them f)ff. 

Follow them next to iheir huts ; some with and 
some without floors. — Go at night, view their means 
of lodging, see them lying on benches, some on the 
floor or ground, some sitting on stools, dozing away the night; 
— others, of younger age, with a bare blanket wrapped about 
them ; and one or two lying in the ashes. These things / 
have often seen with my own eyes. 

Examine their means of subsistence, which consists gene- 
rally of seven quarts of meal, or eight quarts ofsmfdl rice for 
one week ; then follow them to their work, with driver and 
overseer pushing them to the utmost of their strength, by 
threatening and whipping. 

If they are sick from fatigue and exposure, go to their 
huts, as I have often done, and see them groaning under a 
burning fever or pleurisy, lying on some straw, their feet to 
the fire, with barely a blanket to cover them, • or on some 
boards nailed together in the form of a btxlstead. 

And after seeing all this and hearing them tell of their suf- 
ferings, need I ask, is thei'e any evil connected with their con- 
dition, and if so upon whom is it to be charged \ I answer 
for myself and the reader can do the same. 

Our govenmicnt stands first chargeable for allowing Slavery 
to exist under its own jurisdiction. Second, the States, for 



21 

enacting laws to secure their victims. Third, the slaveholder, 
for carrying out such enactments, in horrid form enough to 
chill the blood. Fourth, every person who knows what 
slavery is, and does not raise his voice against this crying sin, 
but by silence gives consent to its continuance, is chargeable 
with guilt in the sight of God. "The blood of Zacharias, 
who was slain between the temple and altar," says Christ, 

"will I REQUIRE OF THIS GENERATION." 

Look at the slave, his condition but little, if at all, better 
than that of the brute ; chained down by the law, and the 
will of his master; and every avenue closed against relief; 
and the names of those who plead for him, cast out as 
evil; — must not humanity let its voice be heard, and tell to 
Israel their transgi'essions, and to Judah their sins? 

May God look upon their afflictions, and deliver them 
from their cruel task-masters ! I verily believe He 
will, if there be any efficacy in prayer. I have been to 
their prayer-meetings and with them offered piayer in their 
behalf. I have heard some of them in their huts before 
day-light, praying in their simple broken language, telling 
their heavenly Father of their trials in the following and 
similar language : 

"Fader in heaven, look upon de poor slave, dat have 
to work all -de day long, dat cant have de time to pray 
only in de night, and den massa mus not know it.* Fader, 
have mercy on massa and missus. Fader, when shall poor 
slave get through de world ! when will death come, and de 
poor slave go to heaven ;" and in their meetings they fre- 
quently add, "Fader, bless the white man dat come to hear 
de slave pray, bless his family," and so on. They uniformly 
begin their meetings by singing the following : — 

''And are we yet alive 

To see each other's face," &c. 

Is the ear of the Most High deaf to the prayer of the 
slave 1 I do firmly believe that their deliverance will come, 
and that the prayer of this poor afllicted people will be an- 
swered. 

•At this time there was some fear of insurrection , and the slaveis were 
forbidden to hold meetings. 



Emancipation would be safe. I have had eleven winters 
to learn the disposition of the slaves, and am satisfied they 
would cheerfully work for pay. Give them education, equal 
and just laws, and they will become a most interesting peo})le. 
Oh! let a cry be raised which shall awaken the conscience of 
this guilty nation, to demand for the slaves immkdiate and 
unconditional emancipation. 

Nkjiemiah Caulkins. 



NARRATIVE 



9 



AN EXTRACT FROM 



"IMERIfJlN SLMEliY, AS ITIS/' 



NEW YOUK : 
Pnlilished by the American and Foreign Anti-Slavery Society. 

WILLIAM HARiVKD, PUBLISHING AGKNT, 61 JOH>f STREET 
1849. 



%=^ PREFACE 
^ 

Mr Nehemiah CAnLKiNS, of Waterford, New London Co., 
Connecticut, has furnished the Executive Committee of the 
American Anti-Slavery Society, with the following state- 
ments relative to the condition and treatment of slaves, in the 
south-eastern part of North Carolina. Most of the facts re- 
lated by Mr. Caulkins fell under his personal observation. 
The air of candor and honesty that pervades the narrative, 
the manner in which Mr. C. has drawn it up, the good sense, 
just views, conscience and heart which it exhibits, are suffi- 
cient of themselves to commend it to all who have ears to hear. 

The Committee have no personal acquaintance with Mr. 
Caulkins, but they have ample testimonials from the most re- 
spectable sources, all of which represent him to be a man 
whose long established character for sterling integrity, sound 
moral principle and piety, has secured for him the uniform 
respect and confidence of those who know him. 

Without further preface the following testimonials are sub- 
mitted to the reader. 

"This may certify, that we the subscribers have lived for a number of 
years past in the neighborhood with Mr. Nehemiah Caulkins, and have no 
hesitation in stating that we consider him a man of high lespectability, 
and that his character for truth and veracity is unimpeachable." 
Peter Comstock. D. G. Otis. 

A. F. Pe»kixs, M. D. Philip Morgaiv. 

Isaac Beebe. James Rogers, M. D." 

LUDOWICK Beebe. 
Waterford, Ct., Jan. 16th, 1S39. 

Mr. Comstock is a Justice of the Peace. Mr. L. Beebe is 
the Town Clerk of Waterford. Mr. J. Beebe is a member 
of the Baptist Church. Mr. Otis is a member ofthe Congre- 
gational Church. !Mr. Morgan is a Justice of the Peace, and" 
Messrs. Perkins and Rogers are designated f)y their titles. 
All these gentlemen are citizens of Waterford, Connecticut. 

"To whom it may concern. This may certify that Mr. Nehemiah 
Caulkins, of Waterford, in New London County, is a near neighbor to the 



IV. PR i; FACE. 

subscriber, and has been for many years. I do consider him a man o{ un- 
questionable veracity, and certify that he is so considered by people to 
whom he is personally known. Edward R. Warren." 

Jan. 15th, 1S39. 

Mr. Warren is a Commissioner (Associate Judge) of the 
County Court, for New London County. 

This may certify that Mr. Nehemiah Caulkins, of the town of Water- 
ford, County of New Loudon, and State of Connecticut, is a member of 
the first Baptist Church in said Waterford, is in good standing, and is es- 
teemed by us a man of truth and veracity. 

Fr.ANCis Darrow, Pastor of said Church." 

'•This may certify tliat Nehemiah Caulkins, of Waterford, lives near 
me, and I always esteemed him, and believe him to be a man of truth and 
veracity. Ejlisha Beckwith." 

Ja7i. 16th, 1S39. 

Mr. Beckwith is a Justice of the Peace, aPost Master, and 
a Deacon of the Baptist Church. 

Mi-. Dwight P. Janes, a member of the Second Congrega- 
tional Church in the city of New London, in a recent letter 
says : 

"Mr. Caulkinsis amember of the Baptist Church in Water- 
ford, and in every respect a very worthy citizen. I have 
labored with him in the Sabbath School, and know him to be 
a man of active piety. The most entire confidence may be 
placed in the truth of his statements. Where he is known, 
no one will call them in question." 

We close these testimonials, with an extract of a letter 
from William liolles, Esq., a well known and respected citi- 
zen of New London, Ct. 

Mr. Nehemiah Caulkins resides in the town of Waterford, 
about six miles from this City. His opportunities to acquire 
exact knowledge in relation to Slavery, in that section of our 
country to which his narrative is confined, have been very 
great. He is a carpenter, and was employed principally on 
tlic plantations, working at his trade, being thus almost con- 
stantly in the com})any of the slaves as well as of their mas- 
ters. His full heart readily responded to the call, [for infor- 
mation relative to slavery,] for as lie expressed it, he had 
Jung desired that others might know what he had seen, being 
confidcuit that a general knowledge of fads as they exist, 
W(!uld greatly promote the overtlirow of the system. He is 
a ir.an of uiidoubl(ul character; and where known, liis gtate- 
nients need no corroboration. 

Yours, &c. William Bolles. 



NARRATIYE. 



I feel it my tluty to tell some things that T know about 
slavery, in order, if possible to awaken more feeling at the 
North in behalf of tlie slave. The treatment of the slaves on 
tiie plantations where I had the greatest opportunity of get- 
ting knowledge, was 7iot so bad as that on some neighboring 
estates, where the owners were noted for their cruelty. There 
were, however, other estates in the vicinity, where the treat- 
ment was better ; the slaves were better clothed and fed, 
were not worked so hard, and more attention was paid to 
their quarters. 

Tlie scenes that I have witnessed ai'e enough to harrow 
up the i^oul ; but could the slave be permitted to tell the story 
of his sufferings, which no white man, not linked with slavery, 
?s alloivcd to knoio, the land would vomit out the horrible 
system, slaveholders and rfll, if they would not unclinch their 
grasp upon their defenceless victims. 

I spent eleven winters, between the years 1824 and 1S35, 
in the state of North Carolina, mostly in the vicinity of Wil- 
mington ; and four out of the eleven on the estate of Mr. John 
Swan, five or six miles from that place. There were on his 
plantation about seventy slaves, male and female : some were 
married, and others lived together as man and wife, with- 
out even a mock ceremony. With their ownei's, generally, 
it is a matter of indifference ; the marriage of slaves not being 
recognized by the slave code. The slaves, however, think 
much of being married by a clergyman. 

The cabins or huts of the slaves were small, and were built 
principally by the slaves themselves, as they could find time 
on Sundays and moonlight nights ; they went into the swamps, 
cut the logs, backed or hauled them to the quarters and put 
up their cabins. 

When I first kn^w Mr. Swan's plantation, his overseer wa? 
a man who bad been a Methodist minister. He treated the 
slaves with great cruelty. His reason for leaving the minis- 
try and becoming an overseer, as I was informed, was tliis : 



his wife had died, at which he became so enraged, that he 
swore he would not preach for the Lord another day. This 
man continued on the plantation about three years ; at the 
close of whicli, on settlement of accounts, Mr. Swan owed 
him about $400, for which he turned him out a negro woman, 
and about twenty acres of land. He built a log hut, and 
took the woman to live with him ; since which I have been 
at his hut, and seen four or five mulatto children. He has 
been appointed -a justice of the jteace^ and his place as overseer 
was afterwards occupied by a Mr. Galloway. 

It is customary in that part of the country, to let the hogs 
run in the woods. On one occasion, a slave caught a pig 
about two months old, which he carried to his quarters. The 
overseer, getting information of the fact, went to the field 
where he was at work, and ordered him to come to him. 
The slave at once suspected it was something about the pig, 
and fearing punishment, dro[)ped his hoe and ran for the 
woods. He had got but a few rods, when the overseer raised 
his gun, loaded with buck shot, and brought him down. It 
is a common practice for overseers to go into the field armed 
with a gun or pistols, and sometimes both. He was taken 
up by the slaves and carried to the plantation hospital, and 
the physician sent f.)r. A physician was em.ploycd by the 
year to take care of the sick or wounded slaves. In about 
six weeks this slave got better, and was able to come out of 
the hospital. He came to the mill where I was at work, 
and asked me to examine his body, which I did, and counted 
twenty-six duck shot still remaining in his flesh, though the 
doctor had removed a number while he was laid up. 

There was a slave on Mr. Swan's plantation, by the name 
of Harry, who, during the absence of his master, ran away 
and secreted himself in the woods. This the slaves some- 
times do, when the master is absent for several weeks, to 
escape the cruel treatment of the overseer. It is common 
for tliem to make preparations, by secreting a mortar, a 
hatchet, some cooking utensils, and whatever things they can 
get that will enable them to live while they are in the woods 
or swamps. Harry staid about three months, and lived by 
robbing the rice grounds, and by suc-li other means as came 
in his way Tlie shives generally know where the runaway 
is secreted, and visit him at night and on Sundays, (^n the 
return of Uis master, some of the slaves were sent for Harry. 



When he came home he was seized and confined in tlie 
stocks. The stocks were built in the barn, and consisted of 
two heavy pieces of timber, ten or more feet in length, and 
about seven inches wide ; the lower one, on the floor, has a 
number of holes or places cut in it, for the ancles ; the upper 
piece being of the same dimensions, is fastened at one end by 
a hinge, and is brought down after the ancles are placed in 
the holes, and secured by a clasp and padlock at the other 
end. In this manner the person is left to sit on the floor. 
Harry was kept in the stocks day and nighifor a week and 
flogged every morning. After this, he was taken out one 
morning, a log chain fastened around his neck, the two ends 
dragging on the ground, and he sent to the field, to do his 
task with the other slaves. At night he was again put in the 
stocks, in the morning he was sent to the field in the same 
manner, and thus dragged out another week. 

The overseer was a very miserly fellow, and restricted his 
wife in what are considered the comforts of life — such as 
tea, sugar, &c. To make up for this, she set her wits to 
work, and, by the help of a slave, named Joe, used to take 
from the plantation whatever she could conveniently, and 
watch her opportunity during her husband's absence, and 
semi Joe to sell them and buy for her such things as she di- 
rected. Once when her husband was away, she told Joe to 
kin and dress one of the pigs, sell it, and get her some tea, 
sugar, &c. Joe did as he was bid, and she gave him the offal 
for his services. When Galloway returned, not suspecting 
his wife, he asked her if she knew what had become of his pig. 
She told him she suspected one of the slaves, naming him, had 
stolen it, for she had heard a pig squeal the evening before. 
The overseer called the slave up, and charged him with the 
theft. He denied it, and said he knew nothing about it. The 
overseer still charged hini with it, and told him he would 
give him one week to think of it, and if he did not confess 
the theft, or find out who did steal the pig, he would flog 
every negro oti the plantation : before the week was up it 
was ascertained that Joe had killed the pig. He was called 
up and questioned, and admitted that he had done so, and 
told the overseer that he did it by the order of Mrs. Galloway, 
and that she directed him to buy some sugar, &c. with the 
money. Mrs. Galloway g'ave Joe the lie ; and he was terri- 
bly flogged. Joe told me he had been several times to the 



smoke-house with Mrs. G. and taken hams and sold them, 
which her hushand told me he supposed were stolen by the 
negroes on a neighboring plantation, Mr. Swan, healing oi 
the circumstance, told me he believed Joe's story, but that 
his statement would not be taken as proof ; and if'every slave 
on the plantation told the ssinie story, it could not be Teceiveil 
as evidence against a white peison. 

To show the manner in which old and worn out slaves are 
sometimes treated, I will state a fact. Galloway owned a 
man about seventy years of age. The old man was sick anJ 
went to his hut ; laid himself down on some straw with his 
feet to the fire, covered by a piece of an old blanket, and there 
lay four or five days, groaning in great distress, without any 
attention being paid him by his master, until death ended hia 
miseries ; he was then taken out and buried with as little cer- 
emony and resjject as would be paid to a brute. 

There is a practice prevalent among the planters, of let- 
ting a negro off from severe and long continued punishmenti 
on account of the intercession of some wlkite person, who 
pleads iu his behalf, that he believes the negro will behave 
V)etter, that he promises well, and he believes he will keep 
his promise, &c. The planters sometimes get tired of pun- 
ishing a negro, and, wanting his services in the field, they get 
some white person to come, and, in the presence of the slave, 
intercede for him. At one time a negro, named Charles, was 
confined in the stocks in the building where I was at work, 
and had been severely whipjied several times. He begged 
me to intercede for him and tiy to get him released. I tokl 
him I would ; and when liis master came in to whip him 
airain, I went up to him and told him 1 had been talking with 
Charles, and he ha<] promised to behave better, &c., and re- 
quested him not to ))unish him any more, but to let him go. 
He then said to Charles, "As Mr. Caulkins has been plead- 
ing for you, I will let you go on his account ;" and accord- 
ingly released him. 

VV^omen are generally shown some little indulgence for 
three or four weeks previous to child-birth; they are not often 
punished at such times, if they do not finish the task assign- 
ed them; it is, in sftme cases, passed over with a severe re- 
primand, and sometimes without ary notice being taken of it. 
riiey are generally allowed four weeks afler the Inrth of a 
child, before they are compelled to go into the field; they then 



take the child with them, attended sometimes by a h'ttic girl 
or boy, from the age of four to six, to lake caie of it while the 
mother is at work. When there is no child that can be spared, 
or none youn? enough for this service, the mother, after nurs- 
ing, lays it under a tree, or by the side of a fence, and goes to 
her task, returning at stated intervals to nurse it. While 1 
was on this plantation, a little negro girl, six years of age, 
destroyed the life of a child about two months old, which was 
left in her care. It seems this little nurse, so called, got tired 
of lier charge and the labor of carrying it to the quarters at 
ni'^ht, the mother being obliged to work as long as she could 
see. One evening she nursed the infant at sunset as usual, 
and sent it to the quarters. The little girl, on her way home, 
had to cross a run, or brook, which led down into the swamp ; 
when she came to the brook, she followed it into the swamp ; 
then took the infant and plunged it head foremost into the 
water and mud, where it stuck fast ; she there left it and went 
to the negro quarters. When the mother caine in from the 
field, she asked the giil where the child was; she told her 
she had brought it home, but did not know where it was; 
the overseer was immediately informed, search was made, 
and it was found as above stated, dead. The little girl 
was shut up in the barn, and confined there two or three 
weeks, when a speculator came along and bought her for two 
hundred dollars. 

The slaves aie obliged to work from daylight till dark, as 
long as they can see. When they have tasks assigned, which 
is often the case, a few of the strongest and most expert 
sometimes finish them before sunset ; others will be obliged 
to work till eisfht or nine o'clock in the evening. All must 
finish their tasks or take a flogging. The whip and gun, or 
pistol, are companions of the overseer ; the former he uses 
very frequently upon the negroes, during their hours of labor, 
without regard to aga or sex. Scarcely a day passed while 
I was on the plantation, m which some of the slaves were 
not whipped ; I do not mean that they were struck a few 
blows merely, but had a set flogging. The same labor is 
commonly assigned to men and women, — such as digging 
ditches in the rice marshes, clearing up land, chopping cord- 
wood, threshing, &c. I have known the women go into tho 
barn as soon as they could see in the moi-ning, and work as 
late as they could see ;it night, threshing rice with the flail, 



10 

(they now have a threshing machine,) and when they c-ould 
see to thresh no hunger, they had to gather up the I'lce, cany 
it up stairs, and deposit it in the granary. 

The allowance of clothing on this plantation to each slave 
was given out at Christmas for the year, and consisted of one 
pair of coarse shoes, and enough coarse cloth to make a jacket 
and trowsers. Tf the man has a wife, she makes it up ; if not, 
it is made up in the house. The slaves on this plantation, 
being near Wilmington, procured themselves extra clothing 
by working Sundays and moonlight nights, cutting cord-wood 
in the swamps, which they had to back about a quarter of a 
mile to the river; they would then get a permit from their 
master, and taking the wood in their canoes, carry it to AVil- 
raington, and sell it to the vessels, or dispose of it as they 
best could, and with the money buy an old jacket of the sail- 
ors, some coarse cloth for a shirt, &c. They sometimes gather 
the moss from the trees, which they cleanse and take to mar- 
ket. The women receive their allowance of the same kind 
of cloth which the men have. This they make into a frock ; 
if they have any under garments they must j^rocure thcTH for 
tlienisclvcs. When slaves get a permit to leave the planta- 
tion, they sometimes make all ring again by singing the fol- 
lowing significant ditty, which shows that after all, there is a 
flow of spirits in the human breast which for a while, at least, 
enables them to foi'get their wretchedness.* 

Hurra, for gnod ole Massa, 

He giv me de pass to go to de city, 
Hurra, for good ole Missis, 

She bile de pot, and giv me de licker, ' 

Hurra, I'm goin to de city. 

Every Saturday night the slaves receive their allowance of 
provisions, which must last them till the next Saturd;iy night. 
"Potatoe time," as it is called, begins abf.ut the middle of 
July. The slave may measure for himself, the overseer being 
piesent, half a bushel of sweet potatoes, and heap the mcas- 

*Slaves sometimes sing, and so do convicts in jail under sentence, and 
both for the same reason. Their singing proves that they want to be 
happy not that they are so. It is the means tliat they use to make them- 
selves happy, not the evidence that they are so already. Sometimes, 
doubtless, tlie excitement of song whelms their misery in momentary 
oblivion. He wiio argues from this that they have no conscious misery 
to forget, knows as little of human nature as of slavery. 



11 

lire as long as they will lie on. I h-ve, however, seen the 
overseer, if he think the negro is getting too many, kick the 
measure; and if any fall off, tell him he has got his measure. 
No salt is furnished them to eat with their potatoes. When 
rice or corn is given, they give them a little salt ; sometimes 
half a pint of molasses is given, but not often. The quantity 
of rice, which is of the small, broken, unsaleable kind, is one 
peck. When corn is given them, their allowance is the same, 
and if they get it ground, (Mr. Swan had a mill on his plan- 
tation,) they must give one quart for grinding, thus reducing 
their weekly allowance to seven quarts. When fish (mullet) 
were plenty, they were allowed in addition, one fish. As 
to meat, they seldom had any. I do not think they had an 
allowance of meat oftener than once in two or three months, 
and then the quantity was very small. When they went 
into the field to work, they took some of the meal or rice and 
t? pot with them ; the pots were given to an old woman, who 
placed two poles parallel, set the pots on them, and kindled 
a fire underneath for cooking; she took salt with her and 
se asoned the messes as she thought proper. When their 
breakfast was ready, which was generally about ten or eleven 
o'clock, they were called from labor, ate, and returned to 
work ;' in the afternoon, dinner was prepared in tlie same 
way. They had but two meals a day while in the field ; if 
thdy wanted more, they cooked for themselves after they 
retuTned to their quarters at night. At the time of killing 
hogfj. on the plantation, the pluck, entrails and blood were 
givc^n to the slaves. 

When I first went upon Mr. Swan's plantation, I saw a 
slavO in shackles or fetters, which were fastened around 
each' ankle and firmly riveted, connected together by a chain. 
To tl le middle of this chain he had fastened a string, so as in 
a manner to suspend them, and keep them from galling his 
ankles. This slave whose name was Frank, was an intelli- 
gent, gtood looking man, and a very good mechanic. There 
was noi:hin>r vicious in his character, but he was one of those 
high-spi rited and daring men, that whips, chains, fetters, and 
all the rff eans of cruelty in the power of slavery, could not 
subdue. Sjlr. S. had employed a Mr. Eeckvvith to repair a 
boat, and to^ld him Frank was a good mechanic, and lie 
might have h.is services. Frank was sent for, his shackles 
still on. Mr. Beckwith set him to work making trunnels, 



12 

&c. I was em]iloye(l in puttir.g; up a building, and after Mr 
Beck with had done with Frank, lie was sent foi' to as.sist nie. 
Mr. Swan sent him to a blacksmith's shop and had his 
shackles cut off with a cold chisel. Frank was afterwards 
sold to a cotton^lantti'. 

I will relate one circumstance, wliicli she ws the little re- 
gard that is paid to the feelings of the slave. During the 
time that Mr. Isaiah Rogers was superintending the building 
of a rice machine, one of tiie slaves complained of a severe 
toothache. Swan asked. JNIr. Rogers to take his hammer and 
linnck out the tooth. 

There was a slave on the plantation named Ben, a waiting 
man. I occupied a rooin in the same hut, and had frequen* 
conversations with him. Ben was a kind-hearted man, and I 
believe, a Christian ; lie would always ask a blessing before 
he sat down to eat, and was in the constant practice ot pray- 
ing morning and night. One day when I was at the hut , 
Ben was sent for to go to the house. Ben sighed deeply an< I 
went. He soon returned with a girl about seventeen year s 
of age, whom one of Mr. Swan's daughters had ordered \\if.a 
to flog. He brought her into the room where I was, andtoJd 
her to star.d thei'e while he went into the next room : I hea:rd 
him groan again as he went. While there I heard hi^ voit'e, 
and he was engaged in prayer. After a few minutes he I'e- 
turned with a large cowhide, and stood before the girl wi.th- 
out saying a word. I concluded he wished me to leave the 
hut, which I did ; and immediately after I heard the ;girl 
ficrcnni. A.t every blow she would shriek, " Do Ben ! oh 
do, Ben !" This is a common expression of the slaves to 
a person whipping them: "Do, Massa!" or, " Do, Mistre^ i !" 

After she had gone, I asked Ben what she was whipped 
for : he told me she had done something to displeatfe her 
young mistress ; and in boxing her ears, and otherwise be.ating 
her, she had scratched her finger by a pin in the girl's fdress, 
for which she sent her to be flogged. I asked him if e had 
stripped her before flogging; he said yes; he did not like to 
do this, but was ohUged to : he said he was once 'ordered 
to wiiip a woman, which he did without stripping^ her; on 
her return to the house, her mistress examined> her back, 
and not seeing any marks, he was sent for, and asked why 
he had not whipped her ; he replied he had ; she said she 
saw no marks, and asked him if he had madt .; her pull her 



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